


Urchin

by Cliff



Category: X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Angst, Baby Mutants, Boarding School, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Father-Daughter Relationship, Friendship, Gen, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, No Beach Divorce, Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Past Child Abuse, Post Beach Divorce, Psychological Trauma, Rape Aftermath, Recovery, Triggers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-11
Updated: 2016-06-22
Packaged: 2018-02-12 18:57:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 33,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2121051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cliff/pseuds/Cliff
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the events on the beach, Charles, Erik, Raven, Alex and Hank decide to try and forgive each other. Together they start up a haven for young mutants. Their tenuous relationships are both tested and strengthened by the arrival of their first student. A traumatised child who seems to wake all the sleeping ghosts of their pasts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Hedgehog in the Closet

**Authors Note: So this is my first work of FF. I don't really know what I'm doing. Third person narration, but each section has a slightly different POV. Please note the tags. If anyone thinks I need to add tags or warnings please let me know.**

 

 

**Urchin**

 

**Chapter 1. The Hedgehog in the Closet.**  

 

It was subtle at first, a dull itch in her scalp that gradually got worse. One of her teachers saw her scratching and had sent her home with a leaflet about head lice and how to get rid of them. Mother was furious, then relieved when Owens, the butler, didn’t find any mites crawling on Angie’s scalp. Then mother had retreated back into her cold shell.But the itching continued spread all over her, without any sign of bites or hives.

 

Mother reminded Angie of a Galapagos tortoise; old, isolated and lonely. She knew that Mother didn’t want her, that she was an accident, the youngest of five when four were already grown and gone. After all, her parents were busy people with important jobs, they put work first, like any other politicians.

 

Daddy loved her, at least thats what he said, thats what he called it. Angie didn’t know any better until, one day, she saw one of her friends being picked up from school by her own daddy. The way the man had swept the little girl into the air and squeezed her. Like she was made of gold. Like he had really missed her. Somehow she just knew that man didn’t have a false smile when he was in public, and bad habits at home. She knew that man didn’t creep down hallways and… _ssssshhhh… It’s our secret!_

 

She was currently crouched in the closet in one of the spare rooms, where she had been locked, terror making her feel faint. Although her heart was beating violently, her chest felt numb. She knew something was really wrong two weeks ago, when her hair started falling out. The doctor had called it ‘Alopecia’. He said no one knew why it happened, but that sometimes a shock could bring it on.

 

Then she noticed a bump under her scalp, then another and another. Then the previous night when Daddy… Before he… When he sat on her bed and touched the top of her head… She shuddered at the memory of his shout, a combination of fury and fear. And the pain as the entire back of her body was suddenly on fire, bristling with sharp spikes. Like a porcupine.

They’d retracted a second later, but it was too late, he’d seen, he knew. He’d been disgusted and…He’d become violent. She’d curled into a ball among the coats and mothballs, her head on her knees, as she listened to the shouting downstairs, her parents were debating weather to send her away somewhere, or throw her in the river like an unwanted kitten. She felt the spikes emerging again through her bruised and welted skin. Shredding through the back of her bloodied nightdress. Until she resembled nothing more than a hedgehog with bright blue quills.

 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

_Westchester County 1963_

 

All things considered they’d been lucky, Charles thought, as he wheeled himself to the window. Casualties aside, the US government had done what it did best and covered things up beautifully. Erik, perhaps luckiest of all, had been allowed to go free provided he co-operate with the government should they ever have need of his… Skills.

 

There he was now, pacing in the gardens, torturing himself. Charles had been right, whatever killing Shaw had done to him, it certainly had not bought him peace. Since his return to the school He’d been distraught. Since the beach, Charles corrected himself, he’d been distraught since he heard Charles’s terrified admission. “ I can’t feel my legs.”

 

Charles tried not to read him. But his ability picked up static whether he tried or not. He knew that Erik was haunted by what he’d done, by what he’d almost become on that beach. Charles could feel the guilt well up in Erik whenever he saw him in the wheelchair. So now six months later they wandered the halls and grounds, with much unsaid between them. Carefully avoiding one another, for the most part, civil and detached for the rest.

 

On one hand Charles wanted to forgive, he truly didn’t want Erik to suffer any more guilt…But on the other hand he be lying if he said he was entirely at peace with what had happened to him. And being back here, in this place, in such a vulnerable physical condition… It didn’t leave him wanting to talk and share much. There were ghosts in the mansion for him that went beyond the usual regrets and memories.

 

Erik was committed to renovating the East wing, and kept himself quietly busy there, although occasionally enraged German swearing could be heard when the masonry refused to co-operate. Charles wondered if Erik found it therapeutic, to fix broken things.

 

Raven was another story. She’d grown up a lot since that day on the beach. But at the same time retained that enthusiasm she was born with. After Charles admitted his attitude had been holding her back, that his fear for her safely was the primary reason, tensions had eased between them. In fact, she acted a little like a buffer between him and Erik now. Charles had handed over most administrative control of the new school over to her, she revelled in it, arraigning lesson plans and preparing classes. She was tearing her hair out looking for teachers with the relevant… Qualifications. Charles had been slow to use Cerebro after the ‘accident’. Raven had assured him of her support but he wouldn’t feel right recruiting new mutants without Erik. Erik may have relegated himself to school janitor and handyman but, if he was honest, Charles missed his partner in crime.

 

As it stood they could manage the few currently enrolled for the new term, with He, Alex, Hank, Erik and Raven could teach them most of what they needed to know. Although children were generaly so terrified of Erik that he might not be an option. The main issue was that the students were of diverse ages. It wouldn’t be easy to divide them into classes.

 

“NO!” Raven reiterated loudly, slapping the doorframe. “Anywhere between nine and fifteen you said!”

 

Hank raised his hands in a defensive gesture as he explained. “Well… Yes, in a way… I said that, in late onset mutants, abilities can manifest for the first time at around or just before the onset of puberty, so the students could theoretically be any age, although generally no younger than nine. But as you, and the professor know they can be active from birth.”

 

“ So you’re saying we need a kindergarden?” Alex finished for him. “ But they may have more control over their abilities at five than at fifteen, depending on the kid right?”

 

 

“ Right but it varies so much , depending on the individual that…”

 

“ I have it! ” She smiled, clapping her hands together, causing Hank to jump a little. “ We divide classes by age in the usual way for academic classes, history, math and whatnot.” She waved her hand as though the subjects weren’t important. “ Then for the physical classes, for controlling and using their abilities we arrange by the amount of control they have over their…”

 

“ But how to we measure their ability…” Alex interrupted.

 

“ Charles?” Raven asked, “ Charles are you listening to any of this?”

 

He looked up from the window. “ Oh, yes, sorry Raven. you were saying?”

 

She sighed, “ Never mind, we’re just throwing ideas around for the new term.”

 

“ You mean you were throwing ideas at us?” Alex smiled. Her golden eyes blazed at him.

 

“ I guess….” Hank said awkwardly “ I should go and check on the stock I the lab if I’m going to be teaching chemistry.” He and Alex left.

 

Charles cleared his throat, still looking out the window. “ Hows the East wing looking? Will it be suitable for dorm rooms? “

 

“ Why don’t you go down there yourself and take a look?” She asked him with a raised eyebrow. “ I know you can manage that.”

 

“Mmmm.”

 

She crossed her arms. “ Charles, you’re going to have to talk to him eventually.”

 

“ I talk to him all the time. We spoke this morning about steel lintels.” Charles told her with half a smile

 

“ I mean _really_ talk. “

 

“ Raven.” He said softly, swallowing sudden emotion. “ That won’t help him, or me. We need time.”

 

“ What you both need," she said, squeezing his shoulder. “ Is a swift kick in the a… “

 

The phone on his desk rang, she picked it up. “ Hello, Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters!” Clearly delighted at the introduction of their new venture. “ This is his sister… Yes, who is this please?” She handed him the phone. “ Won’t give me a name” she whispered.

 

“ Hello?” Charles asked cautiously, There was a long pause as he listened. His face paled slightly. “ Y…Yes that is what we do… Wh... What kind of mutation?”

 

Raven sat forward on his desk, suddenly alert.

 

“ I see, yes, of course, total confidentiality… Well we don’t actually start term until next month… No, no we can be there today… Don’t… Don’t do that… I’ll need to meet her to ascertain that sir… Sir please calm down… I’m sure we can help you sir… Very w…” He stopped talking abruptly and frowned at the receiver. “ Raven…” He said, still frowning. “ Please and get the car ready, we have to drive to Long Island This afternoon to pick up a new student.”

 

Raven was beside herself. “Who was that?” She hissed “Who _knows_ about us? ”

 

“ It seems that, much to his chagrin, Governor Fisk’s youngest daughter has manifested mutant traits. He wishes for us to… And I quote ‘take the little freak off his hands’ .”

 

“ Sounds like a doting father.”

 

“ Indeed. I think it might be in the child’s best interests to get there sooner rather than later.”

 

“ Well I can’t drive you.” She said tersely.

 

“ Raven? What do you mean?”

 

“ Ohh.” She smiled “ I have a ton of work to do here today.” She rose and walked to the door. “You should ask Erik.”

 

“ Raven!” He called after her angrily as she exited the room “ Its ok I’ll tell him to be ready in five.” She called back. He could here her chucking to herself as she walked down the hall.

 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

The drive from Westchester to Long Island was only and hour or so. They spent most of it in silence. Erik drove with the same quiet intensity he did everything else, his jaw tensing every few seconds. They were just coming into Yonkers when he spoke.

 

“ I suppose it couldn’t harm the school to have the children of politicians in the alumni” He said. “ From a security perspective, they’re unlikely to liquidate an institution that serves their own interests.”

 

Charles flinched a little at the terminology. He wondered sometimes, how paranoid Eric actually was. “ No I don’t suppose they would.” He murmured “ If it ever came to that…But thats not why we’re doing this.”

 

Erik glanced at him briefly. Charles was pale as a sheet. “ Are you alright?”

 

“ Fine... thank you.” He muttered quietly, turning his face to the window.

 

“ How old is she?” Asked Erik.

 

“ He didn’t say.”

 

“ The father… Is he worried the public will get wind of it? Is that it?”

 

Charles nodded “ Of course he is. A lynch mob at the mansion gates wouldn’t look very good in the papers would it? Wouldn’t do much for his reputation if his family line was besmirched with freak blood.”

 

Erik was surprised at the bitterness in Charles’s voice. It wasn’t often the younger man got his temper up. “ I don’t care what you do with her, just take the little freak off my hands.” He said quietly, almost to himself.

 

Erik looked at him sharply. “ Is that what he said to you?”

 

Charles nodded. “ He’s willing to do anything to have her hidden away, out of sight, he’ll tell people she was sent to a foreign boarding school and she need never darken his doorway again.”

 

“ What about her mother?”

 

“He didn’t say… But if she’s anything like _my_ mother she won’t even realise the child is gone.” He said, gritting his teeth.

 

They arrived at the front gate but were quickly ushered into a side door by the butler, as though something illicit or shameful were going on.

 

Charles struggled with the chair on the gravel by the door, before Erik could help him they were greeted by a flustered looking middle aged man, who Erik recognised as the Governor. With him was a blonde woman in a Chanel Suit, his wife Caroline. Who looked as though she’d been hit by a truck full of valium.

 

“Thank God you’re here.”He shook their hands with Erik as they introduced themselves.

 

“Professor! Come into the study.” He said quickly, eyeing the butler distrustfully.

 

“ Um… I’m not the professor.” Erik said stiffly, looking down at Charles who had managed to extract himself from the gravel. “ Oh… Well… You’d better come in.” Said the Governor, looking even more uncomfortable.

 

“ Luckily the staff didn’t see anything.” He said as he poured himself a second whiskey. “ I mean, they know _somethings_ wrong but… It happened last night as I was tucking her in…The first thing I thought of were the rumours about your place, an institution for…You know.” He lifted the whiskey bottle “ Where are my manners, may I offer you a drink?”

 

“No, thank you Governor Fisk.” Charles smiled in a disturbingly polite manner while Erik glowered at the man from his seat.“ We aren’t actually an institution in the sense that you mean it.” He addressed both the governor and his wife, although the woman was clearly utterly disinterested. “ We are actually an accredited private boarding school, you daughter will be very…”

 

The man grunted. “Doesn’t matter, the main thing is that she’s out of the way, out of the public eye you understand? I’ll pay whatever you want, double if you keep her all year.”

 

Although his manner was nonchalant. Charles was observing the man closely. He smiled again “I’m sure that could be arranged, you can always be sure of our discretion sir.”

 

Erik didn’t need to be telepathic to see that his friend was barely holding himself together. His jaw visibly twitched as he spoke, as though he were shivering slightly with cold. Not something anyone would pick up on. But Erik knew that it was a sign that Charles was working with reserve energy, that he was emotionally taxed to his limit.

 

“ And what do you think?” Erik addressed Caroline bluntly. “ She’s your child too.”

 

“ I think…” She said slowly, taking a gulp of her drink. That whatever that _thing_ upstairs is, it stopped being my child the moment it mutated and attacked my husband.” She said it without breaking eye contact. A shudder passed though the room, every metal object vibrated imperceptibly. _Careful Erik! Charles thought at him. Follow my lead and we’ll all get out of here intact_.

 

“Well!” Said Charles, all faux good cheer, “ may we, perhaps, meet the new student?”

 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

She could see light under the closet door, it must be morning, but she didn’t know how long she’d been in there. She was hungry and sore, the numbness had worn off now and the pain from the night before was making itself known. Everything hurt. She wanted to cry but was afraid to make a noise, what if he came back?

 

Suddenly there were voices and the sound of feet on the stairs. And voices, Daddy saying; “she’s in the closet, I’m going to shut you in with her and you can unlock it yourself. When you’re ready to leave, knock to be let out.” Tears stung her eyes. He didn’t even want to be in the room with her. Didn’t trust her, she hadn’t meant to hurt his hand, she didn’t know it would happen.

 

Then there were more footsteps and she heard the door close. Two low voices, men, one sounded English… the other had an accent she couldn’t place. There was a dull thud.

 

“ _Miststuck_! I think I’m going to be sick!”

 

German. She’d met a lot of foreign diplomats and their children. She knew how to swear in couple of languages.

 

“ Erik Please, just, control yourself a little longer. After we have her and are home free you can punch all the walls you like. But all it takes is that… _man_ … changing his mind about us and…”

 

“ Alright! Alright!” Hissed the other voice. Just… Let her out alrea… Whats wrong?"

 

“ I… Erik… I can’t feel her! At all… You don’t think she’s…”

 

There was a sudden squeaking sound, then a violent scratching as he quickly fumbled the key into the lock. She cringed into an even smaller ball and tried to disappear into the corner. Squeezing her eyes shut against the painfully bright light. When the violence she’d been expecting didn’t come. She opened her eyes and peeped up at the figure in front of her.

 

“Oh thank God!” His voice cracked slightly with relief. “ Thank Christ. Are you alright?” The man was down in front of her, while the other one hung back. It slowly dawned on her that he was sitting in a wheelchair. He looked young, terrified, maybe he was scared of her like Daddy and Mom.

 

“They left you in here all night” he swallowed thickly. “ Its going to be alright Dear. My name is Charles Xavier, this is my… My colleague Erik” he gestured to the other man, who stood stiffly by the door as though afraid to approach the closet. “ We’re here to help you.”

 

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

“Angie isn’t it?”

 

Charles asked, his voice soft, the tone people use to speak to frightened animals. Erik remembered that tone from Red Cross nurses and young Russian soldiers after liberation. He had deliberately hung back so as not to frighten her. From his position by the door Erik could make out nothing inside the dark closet.

 

“ Angie, I know you’ve just had a terrible fright. No one expects this to happen to them, I certainly didn’t when it started happening to me.” He heard a little intake of breath, the child had been surprised by that. “But would you please come out? I promise we won’t hurt you. Me and Erik? We’re different, like you…We’ll take you somewhere safe, where there are other people like us.”

 

“Yes?” Charles nodded encouragingly. “See? They retract when you relax, that’s good.” The child emerged slowly from the closet. Whatever had horrified her parents so much, there was no sign of it now. She was small, maybe nine or ten years old, her head was entirely bald, her eyes were huge and startlingly dark blue. Erik felt his entire body go suddenly cold when she stood up, slowly, as though it was a struggle. Her white nightie was shredded and bloody, barely covering her in places. He could see through the tears that she had ugly bruises on her back and shoulders, probably elsewhere too. A circle of finger shaped bruises around each forearm. In the light of the room he saw that she had a split lip also, and the beginnings of a black eye. He blinked, as though maybe he could dislodge them from his vision, they looked so out of place on the delicate skin of a child.

 

“Angie?” He startled a little, he had almost forgotten that Charles was in the room. Charles was staring at her, a picture of sorrow, his eyes starting to water, still he kept his voice calm as he spoke to her. “How did that blood get there?” The little girl opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out. She tried again, then touched her throat. “ It’s alright darling. You don’t have to speak. Can you just nod yes or no for me?” She nodded.“ Did that blood get on your nightdress when the spines came out of your skin?” She nodded again. “ That shouldn’t happen again.” He said to her, “ It only hurts in the beginning, or so I’m told.” She nodded again and looked at her feet. Ashamed, thought Erik, ashamed of her beautiful ability to protect herself.

 

He took off his jacket and held it out to her clearing his throat. “ Here.” He spoke for the first time. “ Wear this.” The child hesitated, gesturing her rags.“Charles would you care to translate?”

 

“ I can’t.” Charles said softly. “ I don’t get a thing from her. Its like she’s wearing an invisible helmet. Perhaps her mutation blocks me.”

 

Erik stared at the child, she gestured her bloody nightdress again then his pristine jacket. Looking upset. _She doesn’t want to get blood on it._ He realised.

 

“It doesn’t matter.” He told her as gently as he could “ I don’t care about that.”

 

As the girl stepped into his jacket, which fell well below her knees. Erik observed that Charles’s hands were shaking so much he was having trouble moving the wheelchair. Erik helped her with the buttons, then wheeled Charles to the door and knocked to be let out.

 

_Erik,_ Thought Charles _I know you’re angry, God knows I am. But when we leave this room please… Our priority has to be getting her out of the house._

 

Erik didn’t have time to be insulted. As the door opened Angie immediately clutched his arm. It was the butler who let them out, neither of the parents were in evidence. But the Girl was clearly terrified. Out in the hallway she looked around fretfully, tightening her grip on Erik’s elbow. He felt a sudden surge of rage. _Clinging to a total stranger to escape her own flesh and blood, who didn’t even see fit to say goodbye._

 

“Do you have anything you’d like to take with?” He asked her “You won’t be coming back.”

 

She looked up the stairs, presumably towards her room. But seemed unwilling to leave their side. “I’ll go with you.” Erik told her.

 

xxxxxxxxxxx

 

When Erik and Angie ascended the stairs and were out of earshot Charles took a moment to wonder at the fact that Erik seemed to be rather good with the child and that _he_ was the one falling to bits. Then he turned to the Butler and put a finger to his temple The man’s eyes immediately became unfocused.

 

“ Whats your name?” Asked Charles

 

“ Owens Sir, James Owens.”

 

Charles smiled. “ Hello James Owens. How long have you worked for the Fisk family?”

 

“ Almost thirty years this Spring sir.”

 

“ Are they good employers?”

 

“ They are adequate sir.”

 

“ Is Governor Fisk a violent man?”

 

“ Yes Sir.”

 

“ Does he beat his wife and children?”

 

“ No sir. Not until last night”

 

“ He beat Little Angela Last night didn’t he? Then he locked her in the wardrobe”

 

The old man’s eyes began to water, a tear rolled down his face.” He did sir. I heard the little one crying, but I thought it better to stay out of the way. It wasn’t my affair you see. Not my place.”

 

“ You said he was a violent man Owens, but that he didn’t beat his family? What did you mean by that?”

 

“ He enjoys causing pain sir, he hunts animals and he goes to dog fights.”

 

“ Half the gentry around here do that.” Charles said, pressing for more.

 

“ He hurts people.” The old man clarified.

 

Charles felt the blood drain from his face. “Does he…”

 

His line of questioning was cut short when Erik and Angie descended the stairs. Erik carried a small suitcase and she held a book close to her chest as though it was a teddy bear. “ _Grimm’s Fairy Tales_ , good choice.” Charles smiled at her. “ Erik likes them too don’t you Erik?” Erik didn’t reply. He looked murderous. Time to leave. “Say goodbye to Owens Angie, we’re going now.” She nodded at the butler who nodded back, and with that they left the Fisk mansion without looking back.

 


	2. The Locked Box

 

One of the first things that Charles learned about other people was that they didn’t like having their privacy violated. So when he helpfully told the milkman that his mother wanted to kiss him, or his first grade teacher got a condolence card three days _before_ her mother died…. They weren’t best pleased. 

As a child he decided that people were like onions, you could take off the peel and maybe the first layer and people thought you were just very perceptive. But any further than that and it started to hurt. For them and also for him. Like onions, they made him cry when he cut too deep. 

There were some onions he would never peel. Raven was one. Because, he’d tried it once and she had pinned him to the floor and threatened to punch his face, and he felt one hundred percent of her outrage. 

The other was his stepfather Kurt. Because he didn’t like looking at what he found there. Although sometimes he would catch a glimpse of things whether he wanted to or not. It was bad enough without hearing the man’s inner voice. 

Now he considered the human mind to be more like a house with many rooms, and some doors were locked and some were wide open. sometimes they were tiny and hidden away and if you forced the lock you’d find them empty inside except for a box with a word on it. 

Raven, had one. He’d found it when he was almost twelve, just before she pinned him to the floor. It was cardboard and had **Before**  
scrawled on it in sharpie pen. She kept it always in a dusty corner of her heart. Sometimes, when she was asleep, or very upset, she would throw images at him. A hole in the ground in central park, covered in corrugated iron. Cold alleyways and hunger and angry, bad, scary people. At those times he wanted to wrap her in cotton wool and never let her out of his sight again. 

Alex had a heart shaped one, in which he kept the memory of his parents. His real parents who were killed in a plane crash, and some memories from prison were tied up in a brown paper parcel 

Hank had a school locker, he used to spend a lot of time locked in it as a child. He was still afraid of the dark. 

Erik had a lot of locked rooms in his mind, and from inside one echoed the screaming of SS guards and the barking of dogs, and inside another was Shaw, his awful smile, terrible pain and fear, in another were thousands of dead bodies stacked like firewood.  
But he also had a locked box. Charles had seen it the first time they met, underwater. It was a steel safe, inches thick and padlocked. Engraved on it was the word **Vinnytsia.**

 

Charles stayed away from it. He figured that after the horrors of Auschwitz and the Sonnderkommando, anything that Erik Lehnsherr wanted to lock away and forget was probably not something he’d be wise to look at. 

 

Charles himself had one. A wooden chest, like an army locker, and scratched on the surface was **Home.** He hadn’t looked inside for a very long time. but coming back to the mansion for the first time since the fire had made the box heat up and smoke, it scared the hell out of him. After the fire he had closed a chapter in his life, and that was the first time he’d felt truly safe in a very long time. 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Erik had allowed the child to lead him up the wide staircase to her room. She didn’t make a sound when she walked. Her room was in chaos. The curtains pulled down, the small writing desk turned over, shards of glass from a broken lamp littered the floor. She stood silently at his side. Staring in shock at the wreckage as though it were a bomb site. Erik cleared his throat. He wasn’t used to being the most communicative person in the room. 

“ Stay here, you need shoes.” He told her, thinking of the glass on the carpet. He found a pair of black Mary Janes under the bed and helped her step into them. As she stepped into the shoes he saw the bruises and swelling around her ankle. He was going to come back and kill that man, he decided. 

“Do you have a bag or suitcase?” 

She pointed to the top of her wardrobe, There was a small, grey leather suitcase. He took it down and made to lay it on the bed. For a moment he froze, the duvet had been torn open and feathers were everywhere, he could see that the sheet beneath was blood stained. Quickly pulling the remains of the cover back over the bed he began to look through drawers for clothing. He was suddenly assailed with the memory of his mother packing the family’s belongings into a single suitcase while the Gestapo shouted at her _“Schnell! Hurry! No toys, no books!”_

He turned to the girl. “Do you have any toys or books you want to bring?” 

She began to pick through the wreckage of her bedroom., while he rushed to get the essentials. Small stockings and vests, little dresses and shoes. Don’t think. Just do. On top she added a stuffed Rabbit that had seen better days and a wooden music box. There wasn’t much room left. She debated for a moment over several books, Then grabbed a thick copy of _Grimm’s Fairy Tales_ off the floor and held it close to her body like a shield. 

“ That all?” 

She nodded. 

“ Are you in pain?” 

She looked at her feet. Not wanting to make eye contact with him. 

“ Do you want me to carry you?”

She shook her head, turned and walked out of the room. 

_Stubborn._ He thought. _Good._

Once she and Charles were safely ensconced in the car, it still felt like being stabbed in the heart - helping Charles into the car, he drove like he was escaping hell. 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hank wasn’t in his lab. Instead she found him in the East wing. Erik had done impressive work over the last few months, being able to levitate stuff through the air helped move things along, of course. 

He was sitting cross legged in the long, empty corridor, reading a book, turning pages with his toes. He looked up at the sound of her shoes tapping the hardwood floor.

“ Hey!” She smiled cautiously and sat down beside him. 

“ Hey.” He smiled back. 

“ It occurred to me about twenty minutes ago that I owe you an apology.” she told him. 

“ Um… An apology? For what?” 

“ Well… Sometimes I forget that most people don’t consider shouting a normal method of communication. I get excited sometimes, nothing personal.” 

“ Um… Gee… I really don’t even… Mind at all.” He said, a little flustered.

“ Yeah well, just so you know I wasn’t mad or anything just… Me. I blame Charles for spoiling me as a child.”

“ I er… I like your… Personality.” He murmured, twitching the page with his toe. 

“ That all you like about me?” she asked teasingly.

“ Well… No I like… Lots of your… Things…” he stammered. 

She took pity and cut him off with a laugh. “ Its ok Hank… I’ll leave you to your book.”

“ No! I mean…don’t go. I wanted to ask you about…. This… The East wing.” 

“ What about it?” 

“ What happened here?”

“ You mean the fire? Well… I don’t remember much of it. We used to sleep down here, me and Charles. At first we shared a room down at the end of the hall. Then, After Sharon died, Kurt… Thats Charles’s Stepfather, decided to put me down at the other end. It didn’t work too well. I used to have nightmares, so I’d sneak into his room some nights. Anyway… Did I mention Kurt’s lab was down here too? He used to check on us at night after work. Had a real problem with us sharing a bedroom, said we were too old. “

“ How old were you?”

“ Charles was twelve. I was around ten… I really don’t know what his problem was.” She went quiet for a moment , considering something, When she continued her voice was rougher. “Anyway He’d sneak around up here to make sure I was in my own bed, used to get real ratty about it too, the shithead… So one night I woke up from a nightmare and did what I always did which was to run down the hall to Charles, but when I got there he wasn’t in bed.”

Her breathing had become a little erratic. Hank put a hand on her back. “ If you don’t want to talk about it you don’t have to.” He hadn’t learned much about Raven’s childhood. She and Charles didn’t reminisce like some siblings. 

“ No… No It’s just that I’ve never really talked about it before… Um… Anyway, he wasn’t there so I went looking and I heard something in Kurt’s lab. I wasn’t allowed in there, ever. There were dangerous chemicals… It was Charles’s voice, he was yelling and Kurt was yelling and… That never used to happen … Well… Kurt used to yell a lot but Charles _never_ yelled back…. And I approached the door, it was open…I remember…” She frowned “ I heard them, and I was very, very afraid for some reason… I stood in the doorway and… I don’t really know what happened but something spilled and there was an explosion. I landed on my back. I think I must have been knocked out… 

She pinched the bridge of her nose.

“ I remember being carried outside under Kurt’s arm, and Charles was under the other arm… I don’t know how he did it… All I could smell was Kurt’s burning flesh… Charles was just flopping around, I thought he was _dead_ …. He dropped us outside on the gravel and he just… Fell down and died… So… “ She laughed as she wiped her eyes. “ I guess the bastard did one good thing in his life.” 

“ Wow…No wonder he doesn’t come down here.” 

“ Yeah” 

xxxxxxxxxx

When they returned to the main part of the house it was to find Alex already looking for them. 

“ Guys! Our first student is here! ‘Cmon, lets introduce ourselves! “ 

They were in the kitchen. Charles was at the table, drinking what looked like a very large glass of scotch. He looked like he’d seen a ghost and was about as pale as one. At the stove was the rather incongruous sight of Erik stirring canned soup. Beside him on the countertop sat a child of indeterminate age and gender, with a bald head. Wearing a man’s Jacket. Raven assumed, from the shoes, that it was female. 

When they walked in, the child reacted by suddenly sprouting blue, three inch, spines all over her head, up to the hairline, and presumably her body. Only her lower legs were visible, but the backs of her calves from knee to heel were covered in them. She then jumped up on the countertop and tried to escape through the window. Her eyes like saucers, throat working in a silent scream. Raven cursed herself for not changing into her usual disguise. She supposed two blue monsters walking into the room would be enough to unnerve anyone. Hank looked devastated. 

Charles panicked, normally he’d be able to calm a frightened child with telepathy, but in this case it seemed he could do nothing. He watched as Erik immediately turned the stove off and blocked her access to the window with his arm.

“No… No! “ He told her firmly. “Stop!” 

She was hysterical, desperately trying to get out. Shaking the window latch. Erik, gripped her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “ Look at me!” 

The girl was gasping for breath, her entire body shook as she stilled, emitting a low growl deep in her throat, like a wounded cat.

“ They’re friends! “ He told her loudly and firmly. “ They’re like us!.” 

She turned slowly to look at them again, still on guard, her quills shivering slightly. 

Charles moved over to the counter. “ Angie. This my sister Raven, and our friends and colleagues, Hank and Alex. Everyone, this is Angie Fisk.”

“ Hi.” The three younger mutants greeted her nervously. 

“ Shake hands.” Erik said firmly. “ It’s polite.” 

Charles looked at him in astonishment. _Erik! Can’t you see the child is terrified?_

“ Just do it.” He continued, nonchalantly, getting back to the soup. 

To their surprise Angie extended her arm. Alex approached her first, Then Raven, and finally, with some trepidation, Hank. They shook her hand, careful to avoid her prickly wrist. She had calmed considerably and the spines now lay flat against her skin. 

They all sat down to soup. Angie sitting on several cushions to elevate her. She was ravenous, stuffing bread and butter into her mouth as though she hadn’t eaten in a week. But Erik said nothing further about manners or politeness. Pouring her a glass of water instead. Between bites she stared at Raven and Hank with obvious fascination. 

Charles suddenly spoke in his mind. _Angie?_ The girl gave no sign of having heard him. _Angie can you hear me?_ When it became clear that she couldn’t he spoke to the others. _It seems that she had the ability to block telepathy. I can’t read her and she can’t hear me. It’s as though her mind is a steel trap. Quite extraordinary… I wonder Erik… If you wouldn’t mind moving the spoon she’s using?_

Erik glanced at her spoon, then glanced again…Then stared at it aggressively. Nothing. He frowned at his own cutlery and it promptly twisted into a spiral. Angie’s mouth dropped open in astonishment. 

“Erik can control metallic elements Angie” Charles explained. She quickly held out her own spoon in front of him. Eager to see the trick again. “But apparently not while you hold them… Most interesting.” 

“ You want to see mine?” Asked Raven. Angie nodded cautiously. Raven transformed into a second Alex. Angie gasped and thumped the table in surprise.  
Hank, who seemed to be warming up at last, passed Angie the salt with his foot. This actually got a smile out of her, but she continued to eye Raven a little suspiciously. She pointed at Alex and he laughed. 

“ Ummm… Maybe not at the dinner table… I…”

“ He makes things explode.” Explained Hank. 

" Who me?" Asked Raven- as- Alex.

" No, the other you."

While the younger mutants entertained her, Charles observed the girl closely. He was fascinated. Here was someone who was naturally immune to the effects of Mutant powers. Yet she could see Raven’s transformation just fine… No, she didn’t neutralise them… It was the direct effect on her personally that she could stop. Raven altered her own body physically, Erik altered metal physically… He wondered if Raven were to touch the girl if her hand would suddenly be back to it’s blue self. Because the child’s powers were… _Defensive… Very defensive, and with good reason._ He noted other things about her too, the slightly hunched posture, the way she occasionally flinched when she moved _Hiding it well_ He thought _Keeping it inside like your mind and body are a locked box… I know that shame well enough._

He realised that Erik was staring at him he was suddenly gripped with fear. He hadn’t been projecting… Had he? No, the others hadn’t noticed anything. 

“ Charles are you all right?” Asked Erik quietly. 

_What do you care really?_ asked a bitter corner of his mind that he kept hidden. _Do you want me to reassure you that whatever's wrong isn’t your fault?_ He didn’t need any half sincere sympathy. He was an adult man and could, no _had to_ get on with his life. 

“ I’m just tired.” He said aloud with a small smile… He realised that he did, in fact, want to reassure Erik. “But before any of us can rest I’m afraid I need to speak with Hank.” 

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hank was a scientist. He certainly wasn’t a paediatrician. He wasn’t used to this kind of thing. He’d rather have been doing literally anything else. The small figure was shivering on the examination table, wrapped in cotton, bandages and a bathrobe, her eyes puffy from crying. He swore if he never had to wrap a child’s broken ribs again it would be too soon. Raven stood beside her, gingerly holding her hand. Not quite sure if she was about to get skewered.

He looked down her throat with a flashlight, there was no sign of injury externally or internally. 

“Ok Angie.” Said Hank cheerfully as he could manage. “ You’re nearly good to go, just…” He took out a stick of gum and handed it to her “ No lollypop, sorry.” 

She had been shaken up by the exam, and her exhaustion was obvious. She even allowed Raven to pick her up and carry her out of the room.

Afterwards in the study he related the facts. “ Two cracked ribs, maybe three… A Sprained ankle… Must have hurt like hell to walk on by the way… Bruises and welts on her torso, deep bruising to the abdomen…Probably from a kick…” He paused for a moment to see if the professor was taking it in. Charles was sitting by the window, facing away from Hank, and Erik was pacing back and forth, neither of them making eye contact. 

“ Go on Hank.” Charles said in a monotone.

“ Um… Well, thats it, aside from assorted contusions on her limbs and face and a lot of dried blood, probably from when the spines first came through. The mutism… Well I can only tell you that theres no physical reason for it…”

“ How far up her legs did the bruising go?” Charles asked suddenly. Erik looked at him sharply, as though the question had given him a small electric shock. 

Hank sighed. “I know what you’re asking and the answer is I don’t know, because when I tried to examine her she freaked out and bristled at me… Sorry professor but I’m not going to force her to undergo that kind of examination…”

“Its all right Hank.” Charles said. “ I understand completely. Thank you for doing that, the hospital was out of the question… For obvious reasons.” 

“ No problem, Raven and Alex are finding a room for her, she should probably spend a day or two in bed. I’m going back to the lab.” Hank left behind the lingering thought _don’t make me do that ever again._

“So” Said Erik coldly. “ What are we going to do with him?” 

“ With who?” Asked Charles. “ Hank?” 

“ The Fucking Governor of course!” 

“ Oh… Well I hadn’t really thought about it to be honest… What can we do? If we take legal action the girl might go into foster care and I think we both know how that would end.” 

“ Legal Action!” Erik laughed. “ You’re a fool, Charles, if you think it would ever get that far, when have the powerful ever let justice get in the way of their perversions?”

“ Perversions? We don’t know that Erik.” 

“ What else would you call torturing a child?” 

“ Good point.” He murmured. “ So what would you suggest? Murder? Assassination of a public figure? Thats _your_ game Erik not mine.” 

Erik stared at Charles for a long moment.

“ Do you think he’ll just leave her alone?” He hissed. "I _know_ that man! He has his claws in that child and he’ll miss it eventually Charles and when he comes for her there will be nothing we can do to stop him because he _knows_ what this place is! All the peaceful ideology in the world won’t help her then.” He practically spat the words. 

“ I know him too Erik, I looked right into his mind… We’ll keep all our students safe.” Charles replied. “one way or another.”

“ One way or another.” Said Erik as he strode out of the room and slammed the door.


	3. The Deep Dark Woods.

**Author’s Note: Well, I’m afraid this chapter is mostly backstory and exposition, the plot will advance soon I promise!**

 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

There is a scientific theory that a certain chemical is released in the brain in the moments just after birth, and again in the moments just before death. When synthesised, this chemical causes intensely realistic hallucinations. Some believe that the vivid imagination we experience during early childhood is, in part, due to the residual effect of this brain chemical.

_Raven remembered walking through Fields, and wherever she walked the flowers would follow her, sprouting beneath her feet…. Into the woods where gnomes and fairies lived, and then up the winding staircase, to the top of the tower…_

_Charles would blindfold her and walk behind her, holding her elbows. He’d narrate a story:_

_“ Once upon a time there was a little princess… Who went outside and saw?..”_

_“ The Beach!” She cried. And sure enough, there was the golden sand and the soft sound of the waves, and the beach was empty and there are coloured shells strewn around and the sound of seagulls and… Wether it was her own imagination or Charles’s tinkering was never in doubt. She would give him the raw material and he would embellish it and form it into something truly magical. She could even feel the sand between her toes._

_“ And then, she turned…” He steered her around “…and saw a…”_

_“ Dolphin!”_

_All the worlds she explored were magical, special and just for them. He would always take her to places that were beautiful, even if she steered him into the Deep Dark Woods. Which was kind of scary, she’d always be grateful for his hands gripping her elbows when they went there. Although, they always had their best adventuress there too._

_Most of the time Charles suggested playing “The Game” himself. He loved creating worlds with her. Other times she’d come running to him with a new idea. But more and more often he wouldn’t want to play, and when he tried The Game got strange and scary. Monsters and nameless Dark Things began to dwell in the woods..._

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Erik started work early the next day, while the rest of the household was asleep, after his altercation with Charles the previous night he felt the need for distraction. He honestly didn't know why he had reacted so strongly to Charles's logic, and didn't want to examine his motives just now. He was putting up drywall when he heard footsteps above his head. Who was in the attic room?

He went into the hall to see the ladder was down. He poked his head through the opening to discover Raven and Alex, in the dim light, among the sundry, dusty old furniture and paintings. They were sorting through boxes. She looked up and smiled.

“ Oh! Hi Erik. Want to check out all the old stuff we can use for the dorm rooms?”

“ Erik coughed a little. He’d disturbed decades of dust just by walking in, and almost tripped over a rocking horse.

“Ok I need a box that says “ Ballet.”.. Or maybe “ Raven” … I forgot how much crap was up here.” She murmured, sounding a little daunted.

There was , indeed, a lot of sheet covered furniture that could be repurposed for the dorms. Erik uncovered an old frame only to find it was, in fact, an oil painting of a couple. He almost cried out. The woman was pale, fashionably thin, with blonde hair and shdarp features. The man was the very image of Charles, starched collar and neat hair aside.

Alex stood behind him and laughed “Haha! My God! is that the Professor?

“ No thats his father, Brian and his mother, Sharon.” Replied Raven. “ Jeez! I haven’t seen that thing in years! Kurt removed it from the dining room after he moved in.”

“ Wait…” Alex looked confused “ What do you mean “ _His_ parents? “

Raven froze. Looking at Erik, who knew she was adopted, Charles had told him. She’d never kept the nature of her kinship to Charles a secret exactly. She’d just neglected to mention it and, in all honesty, she almost forgot sometimes.

“ Ummm. Well…Thing is, I’m not actually a blood relative. “

“ Oh!” Alex sounded genuinely surprised and intrigued.

“ Leave it.” Erik told him bluntly. Alex scowled at him briefly before turning back to Raven. She couldn’t just leave it there, she decided.

“ No… Its ok Erik… It’s no secret… We agreed to be honest with each other didn’t we? “

Erik shrugged “Its up to you.”

She continued. “Apparently Brian and Sharon were absolutely besotted with each other. Never apart. Brian died in an accident when Charles was seven. After that Sharon went a bit… Well…A _lot_ crazy. She tried to kill herself and was hospitalised for months. When she came home she was like another person. Disconnected and… Flat… “

Erik had suddenly become very still and focused on her. He obviously didn’t know this.

“Lobotomy?” Asked Alex.

“Either that or too much electroshock, or just too many little yellow pills. Either way she was rarely home, couldn’t stay in one place too long. She didn’t seem interested in Charles at all and wouldn’t even engage him in conversation. He was a smart kid, with no one to talk to.”

“ I’d never have guessed.” Alex smiled sadly. “ That must have been terrible for him. But where were you?”

“ Yeah well That’s where I come in. A couple of years later… I was a street kid. A runaway we think… I don’t really remember much from before… Charles found me in the kitchen one night looking for food. He pretty much adopted me on the spot.”

Erik’s expression didn’t change. But Alex’s eyebrows were somewhere near his hairline at this point. He never imagined Raven was anything except a Xavier. They shared everything, including money. “ And his mother was ok with that?”

“ She was away in San Moritz at the time, stayed away for six months. So it was just him, the chauffeur a maid who came every other day and a butler named Evans. Oh, he had a tutor too… But it was summer so he wasn’t there.

“ He didn’t go to a private school?” Asked Erik.

“ No… He… Didn’t get on so well at school. What with the mind-reading and all. So Brian had this tutor, Lawrence Cole - super genius, come and teach him. Not that he needed him for long, by the time I came along Charles knew more than Cole did.”

“ So, when Sharon came home she never questioned this extra child in her house?” He looked incredulous.

Raven shrugged “He told her the truth, Said I was a friend who was staying for a while. I don’t think she liked me particularly but she didn’t really care one way or another, as long as Charles was happy and out of her hair. She was all “ Oh thats nice dear.” She put on a pseudo English accent. “When he started calling me his sister she didn’t comment on it. I think she kind of liked it, maybe she wanted a daughter. I remember she gave me a pair of diamond earrings once. One of the few times I really interacted with her. “

“ Wow.” Alex was genuinely taken aback. “ I thought I had a weird upbringing.”

“ Oh we Xavier’s have cornered the market on weird.” She laughed.

“ So when Sharon died what happened?”

“ Well she’d re-married by then and her second husband, Kurt, really did think I was her kid. I don’t think she ever bothered to correct him. ”

“ Jesus.”

“ It _does_ sound like a soap opera doesn’t it? It gets even more so… He dies in the fire and we’re free agents aged sixteen and twelve. “

“ Free Agents?”

She opened her arms wide “ _Massive_ trust fund. Charles got emancipated.”

“  My God Raven do you know how lucky you are? “ Said a flabberghasted Alex. “ I mean, I went through a new lousy foster home every few _months_ , you do realise you landed with your ass in the jello right?"

Erik said nothing, frowning a little at Alex’s assessment.

“ Oh yeah, of course I do. I wouldn’t have survived without Charles, for all that he drives me crazy sometimes with his, control freakishness I think… I’d learned to survive on my own.. But he really showed me how to live you know."

“ Mmmm. ” Erik said quietly. Fishing through a box of broken Christmas tree lights. Alex cried out “ Raven!” She jumped.

“ What!?”

“ There… That box says “ Raven.” He pointed to it.

“ Ha! “ She clapped her hands together and dragged it into the light and opened it. “ This is it! My GOD GUYS! Look at this stuff! _Man_ this takes me back!” She pulled out a colourful tie and greet beret.

“ You were a girl scout?”

“ Yup! I got all my outdoor badges too. I was also a majorette!”

“ You’re kidding me.”

She looked offended “ Charles insisted! He said I had to socialise!..Oh WOW! here it is! She fished out a black leotard. “ My ballet stuff! This is what I wanted for hedgehog girl. “

“ I’m sure you can come up with a better nickname.” Erik teased. Raven ignored him.

“ It stretches enough that it won’t tear, and the spikes can pass through the weave easily. She can wear this until she gets the hang of controlling it. We’ll have to try and get that in check by the time school starts. It would be a shame if she turned another kid into a pincushion.”

“ Right… or herself.” Said Alex “ I wouldn’t mind exploring their offensive function though. If she can defend with them then they could probably be used for attack too. Might take a trip home and show her old man a thing or two.”

“ Too friggin' right. “ Growled Raven. Lifting the box ." I’m going to see what else I can find in here, this is awesome! She grinned, clearly enjoying her trip down memory lane. She and Alex descended the stairs awkwardly, balancing the box between them.

Erik slowly regarded the oil painting. Vain, wealthy people. Sons, daughters, father, mothers, There isn’t too much one can say about death that hasn’t been said already. It’s something that, for whatever reason, seems to fascinate our species . We explore all it facets in many genocides and wars and rampages…All Erik knew was that when you take a life it takes something from you. Its not done lightly, you change and warp. He knew that he found no comfort, no closure in killing Klaus Schmidt. It didn’t spare him any pain, it didn’t bring back his mother or the thousands of others who died at the man’s hand. Each death left an empty space inside… Immutable.

As he sorted though the relics of another life, carefully saved from the fire. He wondered what the old house in Germany would have in its attic now, if it hadn’t been emptied of life and then levelled by bombs. His hand shook slightly as he covered the painting again, sweeping dust off the floor as he moved the sheet.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

For a few seconds after she woke, Angie didn’t know where she was. The first thing she was aware of was that her body ached. Which wasn’t unusual for her. She stared at the high ceiling above her head then looked either side at the big, wooden double bed that wasn’t anything like her own. It all came back in a flood of memory. Daddy… The closet… The two men who saved her. She was at their school. She couldn’t remember going to bed? She wondered what time it was.

There was a sudden feeling somewhere in between relief and sorrow… She had been given away by her family. Thats was a bad thing wasn’t it? She should feel grief… So why didn’t she? She didn’t know what they planned to do with her here. No doubt no one would care either. She remembered the furry one and how he’d tried to examine her. She was scared of doctors, they asked questions she wasn’t allowed to answer. She hoped against all experience that this place was really ok. She had no reason to trust anyone here… Did she? Yes they had rescued her from the closet. They’d taken her away from Daddy… They were different, like her. But they did it for the money right? And anywhere Daddy sent her couldn’t be good…She allowed herself to believe it, just for a second, before doubt bloomed again.

She got up and looked first at herself. She was wearing one of her own nightdresses from home. Her right ankle was bandaged up in stiff fabric.The room was old fashioned and stuffy, the bed she was sleeping on was canopy bed, the furniture was mahogany or teak. She knew that from home. On the wall was a painting of a horse. She got out of bed. Her ankle blazed in sudden agony and she fell over with a yelp, thudding hard on the floor.

She sat there for a while, trying to figure out what to do next. Her chest hurt too, quite badly, but she knew that was because her ribs were broken, the furry one had told her that before he wrapped them in bandages yesterday. She considered calling for help and opened her mouth but couldn’t make a sound come out, just choking noises.

After a while she heard footsteps outside and a knock on the door, She tried to call out again. Clearly the chocking noises worked because the door swung open immediately and in ran Raven, the blue girl. Who knelt beside her on the carpet.

“ Hey…” She said softly. “ Did you fall out of bed?”

Angie stuck out her leg and waved her bandaged foot in front of Raven.

“ Oh Honey! I’m sorry! This must have fallen during the night…Here. ” She picked up a small metal crutch from the floor beside the bed. “ Erik made that for you, are you hurt?” She asked as she helped Angie to her feet.

Alex shook her head and examined the crutch, it was exactly tall enough to fit under her arm, and looked just like the one she’d seen Tiny Tim using in the school play, except that one had been wooden, this was smooth, light and silver, with a bumpy texture on the top and bottom to prevent it from slipping. She smiled. No one had ever made something for her before.

“ Hopefully you won’t need that for very long. Your ankle will be fine in a week or two. Certainly by the time the other kids arrive next month.” Raven told her. “ But I’m forgetting why I came up!” She went and picked up the cardboard box she’d left by the door. “ This is some stuff that used to belong to me when I was your age or thereabouts… How old are you Eight, Nine?”

Angie held out both hands, fingers splayed.

“ Ten! Goodness me I’m sorry! I never was good at guessing.” Raven smiled as she opened the box, There are some old clothes that you can try on for size, although you should probably wear this for now.” She took out the leotard. “On account of the spines.”

Angie blushed and looked very hard at the carpet.

“ Don’t feel bad, they’re very beautiful you know! All you need is a little control over when and where and you’ll be perfect! “

Angie couldn’t help gaping at her, she hadn’t really even looked at the spikes let alone thought of them as beautiful, just as a defect, a terrifying illness. But looking closely at Raven she thought she understood. The scales on her body shimmered in the morning light like a peacock’s feather.

“ Always blue huh? You, me Hank. Its interesting isn’t it?”

Angie nodded. Raven held her gaze, golden eyes earnest and understanding.

“ When I was very young people called me a freak and..." She swallowed thickly "...Tried to kill me because of how I looked, and what I could do. It wasn’t until I met Charles that I learned I wasn’t cursed… That it was a gift. After that it still took a long time for me to realise I was beautiful, just the way I am, someone else taught me that.”

Angie growled low in her throat, scrubbed her hand over had face violently and shook her head.

“ Whats wrong… Wait!” Raven went to the side table and came back with a notebook and pen “ Write it down.”

Angie looked at the blank page for a moment, wondering how she could explain her anger. It had been sudden and illogical. Eventually she wrote:

**I don’t want to be beautiful.**

Raven looked a little nonplussed “ Isn’t that what all girls want?”

Angie shook her head.

“ Ok.” Raven accepted. “ There are more important things than looks.”

After that Raven had given her a small tour of the spare room and adjoining bathroom and told her about the rest of the house “ Yes you heard right, we have an actual elevator… For Charles of course.” She winked. “ You won’t want to walk up and down the main staircase is on that ankle, trust me.”

She then left Angie to browse through the box, with the promise of pancakes for breakfast if she stayed in bed and rested. But Angie had to do something first.

There was a fluffy towel and washcloth folded on the laundry hamper in the corner of the bathroom. She tested the faucet , sure enough the water was hot. looking around for soap or shampoo she turned and caught sight of herself in the mirror. For a moment her heart stopped. She thought she was looking at someone else. The bruises on her face stood out starkly in the morning light., Her body looked tiny, thinner, fragile. She removed the nightdress and examined the bandages wrapping her torso. They had helped the pain considerably. They were taped at the back. The idea of asking someone to help her was utterly alien. but at the same time she had to wash herself, she felt disgusting. She’d have to just bathe with the bandages on and let them dry under her clothes. She ran the bath, berating herself Why do you still look for shampoo every time! Idiot! She ran her hand over her bald head. She used to have lots of curly, dark hair. Daddy always told her it was so, so beautiful… She wasn’t sad when it all fell out.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Charles had decided that was the day. He owned the property and it was about time he acted like it. He’d been avoiding the entire East wing for months now, it was getting ridiculous. What kind of headmaster would he be if he couldn’t inspect the dorms from time to time. If teenagers were anything like they used to be, there would be the occasional inspection necessary, for contraband alone.

He still couldn’t get used to the damn elevator, every time he wanted to go upstairs he got half way to the staircase before he remembered. He had wanted to start with the second story because he could feel Erik working downstairs, where most of the fire damage was. Where Kurt’s lab had been, and where… It didn’t matter any more, he told himself. It’s my house now.

Erik was, working on the ceiling, drilling screws into a large oak beam with no tools whatsoever. He was standing far below, watching his work with a critical eye. Charles was amazed by the work. Erik had made an effort, not only to rebuild all the rooms but to restore the old style.

“ Erik?"

Erik started and turned.

“ Charles…" he tried not to sound too surprised. "This is unexpected... I thought you didn't come down here”

“ I’m impressed Erik… The last time I was here everything that wasn’t blackened or charred was soaking wet.”

“ You haven’t been here since the fire?”

Charles shook his head. “It started just there”, he pointed at one of the empty door frames. “In that room.”

“ That was the lab?” Erik asked, “that explains the drain in the floor.”

“ Yes, Kurt used to work in there every night. “ Charles looked into the room, Erik had covered the concrete with pine floorboards, tough, cheap and easy to clean.

“ Do you think it’s wise to have floorboards instead of carpet in the dorms?” Asked Charles with a smirk. “ Theres a lot of scope for hiding places under floorboards, and cigarettes are very small.”

Erik looked scandalised for a moment. “ Charles, don’t tell me you were a _smoker?_ ” He broke into a grin. “ I pictured you as a goody two shoes who wore a tweed jacket and glasses, don’t crush my illusion!” He scolded as he followed Charles though the rooms.

“ Oh I had all sorts of hiding places.” Charles reminisced “ In fact I’m surprised you didn’t find any vodka bottles or boxes of fags falling out of the walls.”

Erik laughed despite himself. The tension between them was still present, but inert, for now. He wondered for how long. The look on Charles’s face as he explored his old abode was odd, Despite his cheerful banter Erik had never seen him look so… Bitter? Nostalgic? Sad? It was a combination of all three.

“ This was Raven’s room” he said. “ Not that she spent much time in it.”

“ No?”

“ We used to share that one,” he pointed to the opposite end of the hall. “ But she got her own when she was older.” A look of anger crossed his face that was unmistakable. Erik new better than to ask about these things. Who was he to poke around in about someone else’s painful past, with his history? But he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t the least bit curious. He’d always, deep down, assumed that because Charles was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and the ability to manipulate, that he must have had a privileged existence. But Raven had painted a picture of isolation and self sufficiency. He said nothing, and Charles continued on his own.

“ She had nightmares.” Charles said, his voice lower, as though he was afraid someone would hear him. “ Almost every night after Kurt kicked her out of our room. Very late at night. I’d hear her sneaking down the hall, stopping half way to make sure he wasn’t still working... He'd always check you see... and then _running_. She’d land on my bed like a bag of hammers.” He smiled. “ She’d sleep then, I could always feel her nightmares starting of course.”

“ You’d wake her?”

“ No I’d replace them with something better.”

Erik was a little surprised. “ You couldn’t do that from down the hall?”

“ Well not yet Erik I was twelve! I didn’t have proper control over on my ability until I was at least seventeen.”

“ Really? I always thought you…”

“ What? That I was a prodigy? Some kind of child superman that could get whatever I wanted?” He looked around the empty room almost paranoiacly. “ No my friend I was just a child like any other. I used my ability to play games and pranks and cheat at cards.” He grimaced slightly. " Not for anything that mattered." 

“Charles I didn’t mean…”

“ I know.” Charles said quietly. “Sorry...I don't know what's wrong with me. Its nothing, really…Just, being home again after all this time… “

“Memories?”

“ Good and bad.” Charles admitted, “ I don’t think I realised before that I’m still very angry about…Some things.”

Erik wanted to put a hand on his shoulder, he wanted to fall on his knees before that chair and beg forgiveness for putting him there. He wanted to shake the man and demand to know why he was so sad, and also to embrace him for calling him ‘friend’ again. He did none of these. Just stood, for a while, in silence with him.

“ I think maybe seeing the little girl in such a state… Especially since I can’t get into her head to help her, is making me more tetchy than usual." Charles admitted.

“ I understand.” Erik replied. He did, There were long buried things in his own heart. Things he would never speak of out loud, that were stirred to wakefulness by the events of yesterday. And it terrified him.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Angie was so happily engrossed in Raven’s treasure box she forgot all about breakfast, cooling on a tray beside the bed. She hadn’t bought much from home, she realised, and the box was full of wonderful things. A skipping rope, a football, a spinning top, some cards, a barbie doll, colored pencils and _books._ She already missed her books from home and most of these she hadn’t read, _Anne of Green Gables_ , _Treasure island_ , _Jane Eyre_ and many more, this was going to be fun! There was also a hardcover right at the bottom called _Red Planet_  which looked like an adult science fiction novel. She opened it up and saw that its wasn’t novel at all. Someone had taken the dust cover for _Red Planet_  and used it to hide a canvass bound diary, handwritten in neat cursive.

She hesitated for what felt like an hour, looking at the introduction. It was wrong to snoop in someone’s diary, no matter how old. But it certainly was intriguing.

_The Diary of Prince Magnus The Third, of Adventures With His Sister Princess Penelope The Second in The Deep, Dark Woods and Other Places._

Her eyes widened. She couldn’t resist peeping…

TBC…


	4. Questions and Answers

**Chapter 4.**

_Today Penelope and I went in search of a particular sage that is rumoured to live in the centre of the Deep, Dark, Woods. We were both quite frightened to venture so far into that enchanted place, but it was important that we spoke with him. You see, the King and Queen have gone missing and it has grown dark and cold in the palace without them. We hoped that this wizard could tell us what had happened to them._

_The woods are dark and green, like twilight, even during the day time. At any given moment we could see small, gleaming eyes watching us from underneath tree roots and the inside of holes. Penny gripped my sleeve very hard, but she is brave and didn't want to turn back. A small figure ran onto the path. it was a little man , about two feet high, he wore a red cap and green cloak. He tried to convince us to leave the path and come back to his home. He said he had food there and a warm fire for travellers. We knew better than to go with him though, and were as polite as we could be as we left him, we didn't want him getting angry and start following us._

_Penny shouted, she'd seen a shadow moving, but it was just a deer…_

Angie stared at the page and blinked a couple of times. She wondered who had written this strange adventure. And when?

_Eventually we found him, he was sitting in a glade, surrounded by animals, he had his eyes open, but he was sleeping, communing with the forest. He was small and wizened,with a long beard and a crumpled, pointy hat…_

_"_ _Um… Excuse me sir…" I said as we approached him. His eyes suddenly focused on us both and he looked angry_

_"_ _Who are you and what are you doing in my woods?" He asked us. Penny nearly jumped out of her skin. We introduced ourselves and explained the problem of our missing parents. He seems to calm down and eventually he reached into a pocket and drew out a small key._

_"_ _Find the lock for this here key." He told us "and you will find your king and queen! "_

The sound of footsteps in the hallway pulled her out of the fantasy. She quickly secreted the book under her pillow and sat up in bed. It was Alex, carrying a tray.

" Well hello there spikes! Heres your lunch. "

She smiled at him in thanks. Although she was a little uncomfortable with a man in her room while she was incapacitated. He placed the tray on the bedside table.

" How are you doing?" He asked " Bored yet?"

She shrugged and pointed to the pile of books.

" Ah! " He said " A bookworm! Good thing too, if you're going to be out of action for a while. Never could hack reading much myself. Made sick days tough."

She smiled again. She liked this one. She thought. He seemed… Normal… Almost.

" Anyway." He fished around in his pocket. " Thought, since your voice is on the fritz you might appreciate this." He passed her a small metal bell. " You need anything, day or night, you just ring. Especially night, we all sleep on this floor. "

She reached forward to accept the gift, he frowned a little and reached over to touch her pillow. The action triggered a response in her she wasn't even aware of until she opened her eyes and found herself curled in a ball, a spiky ball, every quill on her body had emerged. Pushing through the layers of gauze and fabric. She was shaking, and a strange, angry sound was emanating from her throat.

" Woah!.." Alex had both hands out in from of him, defensively. " Cool it kiddo. I wasn't trying anything." Don't get me wrong, its incredible that you can do that…" To her surprise he looked impressed and a little delighted. He reached for her pillow again, slowly this time. " I just noticed that your pillow was wet."

A sense of dread settled in her belly, the bandages, sodden and uncomfortable had seeped though. She hid her face in her hands, mortified.

" Hey?" Alex sat on the edge of the bed, his voice all concern. " Its ok… It happens to the best of us."

She blushed even deeper when she realised he thought she'd wet the bed. the spines began to retract as, shaking her head vehemently, she pulled the edge of the leotard down to show him.

" Oh!" He said, touching the edge of the gauze, understanding. " Why the he…Heck are your bandages soaking wet?

She didn't want to say , but she supposed she'd have to now, she picked up the pen that Raven had left her and wrote **Bath** on her hand.

" Ah.. Ok." Alex was clearly trying to suppress a smile. " You didn't want to ask for help huh?"

She nodded

" I get it. " He said. " But you're rumbled now kid, so let me help you take them off before you get cold and sick. "

She drew back a little, she didn't want him touching her, or undressing her.

He sighed. " I'll get Raven ok?"

At that she shook her head and grabbed his hand. She didn't want people making a big deal about it, she could imagine Raven scolding her or maybe she'd be punished?

" How about." He said softly, turning her and pulling the end of the bandage free. " I close my eyes and pull the end until they're all unwrapped and then you can do the rest?"

She nodded and waited for him to shut his eyes before slipping the sleeves of the leotard off. Alex pulled the end and the bandage unravelled, twisting around her body, as she pulled herself free. She sighed with relief as the chafing wet cloth was removed, the quickly pulled the damp leotard back on.

" Done?" he asked. Then opened one eye to check. " Ok then, you change into something dry and I'll change your sheets."

As she shuffled out of bed, using her crutch, she wondered why he was helping her. She wasn't anything to him but he seemed almost happy to be doing it. She hoped he didn't have an agenda. Still..He handn't tried anything yet, and if he did, she had her spikes now… If only she knew how to control them.

But as it turn out all he did was help her, rooting around in the linen closet, changing the sheets and helping her back into bed. He even hung the leotard over a chair to dry. She felt a strange anxiety as he tucked her in. " There you go kid." he said softly before talking his leave. " Don't be afraid to ring that bell ok?"

She heard the sound of the door close. He was gone. He'd come in and helped her and then he'd gone, without doing anything bad, without wanting anything in return. She buried her face in the pillow and began to cry, without knowing why.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Charles… I know I'm the woman… But if you want a babysitter you've come to the wrong place, you bought the kid here, you talk to her." Raven told her brother as she excavated the overflowing file cabinet.

" That's not why I asked Raven… Its just that… Alex said she reacted badly when she thought he'd touch her."

" Well… He seemed to manage fine. Anyway I'm busy Charles, as you can see." She looked daggers at him but couldn't sustain it, he looked so pathetically worried. " Charles…"

" Its just that…" He stammered. " I'm not good with children… Not young children and you're a girl…"

" Woman. What are you talking about? You're very good with kids."

" Of course… A woman and I just think she'd be more likely to take it on board if you said something."

Raven sighed heavily and walked over to him. She leaned on the chair with both hands, almost pinning him in place.

" Charles… Listen to me… You are going to be a headmaster of a school for children… Not just any children… _Mutant_ children. what do you think thats going to mean? Happy go lucky kids who've never experienced anything rotten? Think again Brother."

He wilted. "You're right… I know… Its just this…particular…"

She leaned in close to him " You're having award time with this one aren't you? You haven't been yourself since you came back."

He stared hard at his knees, fidgeting in his chair. He opened his mouth to say something but thought better of it. Finally he said:

"It's very hard for me, to have _no_ insight into her thoughts."

Raven smiled sadly. "I know… It hurts doesn't it? Not knowing what she's thinking… Knowing she's in pain but not being able to help her... Welcome to my world bro."

He nodded silently and smiled at her. "I'm fine Raven... Really."

"Go on Charles...You saved her life... Go and visit the poor kid."

His smile disappeared. "I suppose you're right."

" I'm always right, " she replied, getting back to her files.

" How could I forget?"

" Stop stalling Charles… Let me get back to work."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

She woke at the sound of his chair, and startled suddenly, glaring at him.

" Hello darling, I'm sorry for waking you." He said in a whisper, she shrugged and sat up slowly, her ribs clearly aching still. He swallowed thickly, feeling a little nervous.

" Angie…" He said finally. "I want to talk to you about the situation today with your bandages."

She paled. He smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring manner, he didn't want her to think she was in trouble.

" I know… I know its not easy for you to believe me… _I know_ … But you don't have to be afraid to ask for help if you need it... With anything.. We'll do our best to help you here."

She nodded slowly, He wondered if she understood.

" And no one will be cross with you if you can't do that yet… It might take some time to get used to things here. I know it's very different to home."

She nodded again.

" I know you probably have some questions for me. And now that you're safe and patched up I thought, maybe you might like to ask them?"

She frowned and clutched her throat.

" Your voice is still hiding away isn't it?" He asked, " Don't worry, I'm sure it will come back soon... I thought that might be the case, so I suspect _that_ …" He indicated the notepad… " Might be a better option."

She picked it up and wrote:

**Where is this?**

He laughed. " Of course you must be wondering that. We're in Westchester. At my school, and family home."

She wrote a line underneath and turned the pad to him.

**Are you a teacher?**

" I'm… I'm the principle. "

**"** **Where are the other children?"**

"They won't be here for another month."

She nodded. As though something was made clear to her. Then paused for a long moment, frowning. Finally she wrote:

**How long am I staying for?**

Charles froze, how to explain this? " Well… He began carefully. "We were rather hoping you'd like it enough to stay as long as you want."

Angie's face was impassive at this, she continued to write.

**Do I have to go home on weekends?**

"No…" _Your parents don't want you_ … "No you don't have to go home at all. "

Her eyes widened a little at this.

**Did he pay you?**

Charles sighed inwardl **y "** Your father payed me the same fee all the parents pay. But… Even if he stops paying you're still staying."

She appeared reluctant to write her next question.

" Go on darling..."

**What do I have to do?**

Charles frowned. " I'm afraid I don't understand the question."

The little girl tapped the page with her pen. Looking him straight in the eye.

" What do children do at boarding school? Well… Study your subjects, learn to control your ability, socialising, sports?"

She shook her head vehemently. The next line was scribbled fast and barely legible.

**If he stops paying… What do I have to do to stay here?**

A chill crept up Charles's spine, a horrible understanding formed between them. he kept his voice steady and gentle. " You don't have do _anything_."

She looked frustrated at this her pen practically stabbing the paper.

**WHY?**

He wasn't entirely sure how to answer that. Was she asking why he would keep her free of charge or why he took her in the first place? He closed his eyes for a moment trying to imagine a response he would have understood at her age.

"Because it's very painful for me to think of Children being... Hurt... None of us want to see anything bad happen to you. "

She stared at him. Her face crumpling , she was clearly confused. She shook her head again, tears springing to her eyes.

His voice cracked slightly in response "You're safe here Angie... I promise, we won't hurt you."

She wiped her eyes hurriedly.

 **O.K.** She wrote.

 _Just like that, trust begins to form_. The trusting nature of children terrified him. "O.K." he replied, his voice breaking a little. "Now… Would you like to do anything? Maybe take a short walk around the house?"

She appeared to consider it for a moment then shook her head and lay back on her pillows. She looked exhausted.

"Would you like me to read you a story? Raven always liked me to read to her when she was little."

She nodded hesitantlly and he smiled, picking up the Book of Fairy Tales she'd taken from home.

" Any preference?" he held the contents page open.

She lifted her head and pointed to a story. Charles' face lit up and he laughed. " Now I see why you chose this book." She smiled at him. He sat back and began to read:

"Once upon a time there was a peasant who had money and land enough, but as rich as he was, there was still something missing from his happiness: He had no children with his wife. Often when he went to the city with the other peasants, they would mock him and ask him why he had no children. He finally became angry, and when he returned home, he said, "I will have a child, even if it is a hedgehog.

Then his wife had a baby, and the top half was a hedgehog and the bottom half a boy…"

xxxxxxxxxxxx

Later that afternoon Erik was in the kitchen, trying to mix two resins into a serviceable wood glue in peace when he heard the telltale squeak of the chair. He looked up to see Charles entering the room. He unconsciously smiled in surprise. Angie was walking beside him, leaning on her crutch.

" Hello Erik." Charles greeted him. "The resident cripples are coming to get some tea."

Angie giggled, without making a sound. It was actually rather disturbing. Erik found he couldn't look at the child. Her eyes so piercing and earnest. They cut into him in a way he didn't like.

" You're looking better little one." He said softly, focusing on his mixing.

" Thats not one of the good china cups is it?" Charles asked. Erik raised an eyebrow but didn't reply.

Charles deposited Angie at the table while he went to make tea. She sat staring at Erik in slightly awkward silence for a few moments. Eventually he felt a gentle tap on his arm and looked up. She was holding a folded peice of paper out to him. He took it from her and unfolded it.

There was a picture of a girl. Drawn in pen in the way of children. a triangle for a body and sticks for fingers. This particular girl was brandishing a crutch. The only things missing were the obligatory hair and the broad smile. The figure had no mouth at all. Scrawled in childish cursive underneath was:

**Thank you for my beautiful crutch Mister Erik!**

Charles fumbled the kettle for a moment, so unexpected was the sudden, massive, surge of pain that radiated from his friend. He turned to Erik in shock, to find him focused on his task, seemingly unchanged. Mumbling " You're welcome."

He should have been on the floor, he should have been in pieces, he should be dead… _Dear God Erik!_

He wanted to dive into the other man's mind, he wanted to root out that pain. He couldn't stand it. He had to leave.

" Excuse me for a moment." He choaked, before swiftly exiting the room. Leaving Erik and Angie staring after him.

" He… Takes turns like that sometimes." Erik told her, knowing perfectly well why Charles had taken a 'turn' this time. Erik finished stirring the resins together and looked up at Angie.

" I could use a hand with this. Would you like to help me?"

She nodded enthusiasticly.

" Well come along then…" He told her, holding out her crutch "We have furniture to fix." They walked together out of the kitchen. Passing Charles's study on the way to the East wing. Erik felt the unwelcome violation of Charles trying to read his mind.

 _Get out of my head!_ He snapped mentally. Feeling Charles withdraw instantly.


	5. Risky Business.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Authors Note: Dear Readers. I'd like to thank each and every one of you for your kind reviews and encouraging messages. I've been out of commission for a while due to a family issue and a move of house. I'm so sorry for the delay!

Over the course of the next two weeks Raven watched Erik and Angie leave the breakfast table together every morning and go to the East Wing. Sometimes she dropped in to see how the work was coming along. Erik would be attaching ceiling lights and skirting boards, or fixing loose chair legs and damaged desk hinges. While Angie sat cross legged on the floor, sorting screws from nails or holding the end of a tape measure while Erik marked lengths of wood. They'd work together for hours in silence.

Raven was surprised. She'd never gotten the impression that Erik liked children. Much less that he would volunteer to spend all day with one. But he appeared neither irritated nor distracted by her presence. He seemed almost… Peaceful.

Angie had no need of the crutch anymore and her injuries were healing well. She didn't flinch and bristle with spines as often either. But she had nightmares almost every night. She would appear at the bottom Of Raven's bed like a small ghost, shivering. But in her waking hours, if it weren't for the muteness, she could have been mistaken for a healthy, normal child. She was polite, as far as the muteness allowed, and tidy, obedient… maybe a little too obedient. But she didn't seem to be frightened by them any more.

Yet over the last few days Charles had withdrawn, become guarded, and isolated himself all day in his study. She wanted so badly for him to let her in, just once. To tell her what was going on in that head of his.

Hank was friendly but skittish as ever and Alex still had the low simmering anger that never seemed to quite cool down. She wondered why, in a house full of men, she was the only one that didn't tend to be moody and hormonal. She wondered if the tension would dissipate with the arrival of more students or if it would get worse.

She had completed her work for the afternoon, Minor admin stuff. She needed Charles' signature on a few things, taking a deep breath she braved the Study. He was sitting at his desk, but he didn't seem to have any work in front of him. He was staring at his hands, with his eyes closed.

" Charles?"

He looked up, and for the brief moment before he smiled she saw the look on his face and felt her stomach flip over. Not good. Not good at all.

" Hello Raven."

" I have some documents for you to sign here." She put them on the desk. He picked up his pen, then paused.

" Raven?"

" Yeah?"

" You've been working extremely hard these last few weeks."

" I've noticed" She smirked.

" I've been worried that… Well, that you're not having as much fun as you should be."

She was surprised. Her social life was not usually his main area of concern. " Don't worry about me Charles." She Joked " I'm about to become a school teacher. My partying days are behind me. "

He frowned, she thought the conversation was over and turned to leave.

" Raven… How long has it been since we went out and did anything? Just you and I? "

" Oh!" She exclaimed, surprised. "I… Well… I don't even remember."

" Thats what I thought… Why don't we go out this afternoon, like we used to?"

She was a little taken aback at the suggestion and suddenly nervous. She and Charles hadn't spent one on one time together since before…

" I… All right… I mean ok that sounds… Fun." She smiled, and his face lit up.

xxxxxxxxxxx

An hour later they sat together in a corner booth at Sandy's Diner in White Plains. It had been at least ten years since they had last set foot in the place.

" Do you remember what we'd always order? " Raven asked with a grin.

" Of course!" replied Charles. "Two chocolate Malts and an order of fries please?" He asked the waitress, as she tottered over in unfeasible high heels. "Unless you'd like something else?"

" No… No thats just great." She'd always felt at home in this place, and was glad that it had changed little since they were children. There they could be anonymous as any other kids in the city.

Ten minutes later, Charles smiled around his straw when he saw his sisters face light up at the taste of nostalgia. " Just like I remembered!" She exclaimed joyfully. She looked 10 years old again.

" Now thats a smile I haven't seen in a long time." He said quietly. She smiled wider. There was a light-heartedness about him that he didn't get to show around the others. This was the real Charles and yet…. She looked at him more closely. He was pale, drawn, he'd lost weight. She wondered how she'd missed it.

After a comfortable moment of silence she cleared her throat and he looked up.

" Charles… I need to ask you something."

" Oh?"

" The past few weeks, frankly, you've been a little off. Theres something wrong… Isn't there?" She stated honestly.

He closed his eyes momentarily and sighed. Trying to sound exasperated but the fear was apparent.

" Raven I don't know what you're…"

" No… No…" She kept her voice level and calm. " Don't evade this… Tell me how bad it is."

" Raven don't…" He sounded more desperate than angry.

" You've been falling apart."

" It's…" He put a hand over his mouth. It was a gesture from childhood. It meant he had something to say but didn't want to say it. " Raven… Not here." He sounded so helpless. She nodded and quietly drank the rest of her milkshake.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Angie had spent the day helping with painting. It had been her job to apply whitewash to the window frames with a small brush. Erik had explained that it was important to keep the glass clean and paint free. He said that it would require steady hands. At first she was terrified that she'd make a mistake, but he appeared to have no qualms about giving hear such a delicate job. His confidence in her, was something she'd never experienced before, and as children do , she had assumed he must be right and proved herself a very capable painter. He didn't compliment or encourage her, the assumption that she would be competent was enough.

Erik was currently floating near the ceiling, using the studs in the wall to propel himself back and forth as he plastered areas with a small trowel.

" I had a job once." He said suddenly. " When I was a little older than you".

She didn't turn from her task, but worked and listened as he spoke. He was so silent most of the time. But every now and the he would have a one sided conversation with her. She wished she could reply, but whenever she tried her throat closed up and she gagged violently.

" In Ukraine, after the war. With a carpenter, I think I learned more from him on the job than I ever learned in school. Mathematics, how to find angles and spaces, things like that. You'd be amazed how much more you remember when it has a practical use."

She wondered what would happen when school started and the building was over. Would Erik still spend time with her when he didn't need her for any jobs? She suddenly felt sad. Very sad, at the thought of losing her role as helper. Her vision blurred and she blinked tears out of her eyes as she painted… The light from the window, obscured and dripping with rain… Soundless sobs…

"Do you want to take a break?"

He was standing behind her now and her shoulders were shaking. He reached around and took the brush out of her hand. She couldn't move.

" Was it something I said?" he asked quietly. She shook her head, trying to level out her breathing, but she was sobbing too hard. She hadn't cried like this since before she'd arrived here. She didn't understand where it was coming from.

" A sad thought?" He guessed. She nodded at that.

" A raindrop can lead to a flood hmmm?" He said, placing a hand on her shoulder. " When we're in danger we have to turn off our hearts. "

She turned to him, he looked calm and sad. He understood something she didn't. He crouched down to her level and looked her straight in the eye.

" It's a big risk isn't it? To turn your heart back on…" He smiled at her then, " Brave girl."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Raven and Erik sat in the Car. She had pulled over at a rest spot overlooking a park. The playground was teaming with activity, children ran and screamed in the sun, and dog walkers trotted briskly by.

" I know, you've been through a lot of crap this past year. Dealing with… The Beach… Not to mention starting the school and…Erik…"

" What do you mean? What about Erik?"

" Don't pretend you don't resent him… What he did to you…"

" I'm fine. I don't…Do you?"

" This isn't about me" She answered dryly. " Then why are you avoiding him? I thought you guys were warming up again but the last week or so… You run a mile the moment he comes into the room."

Charles sighed and rubbed his temples, not for the first time, cursing his sister's perceptivity. " Well… If you must know it's not anything to do with the… Trouble… Between us. It's…" The explanation soured on his tongue. " It's the girl, Angie."

"Wh… You said you couldn't sense her! That she was closed off from you."

" No! Not that… It's… Its what she brings out in him… Its hard to explain." His voice shook a little, Raven wanted to reassure him, to tell him it was ok, that he didn't have to. But she knew that only way he'd even been able to solve a problem was by talking about it.

" Raven… We all have a hidden part of ourselves right? A part we don't show to other people, things we've done or…" He swallowed thickly. " Things that have been done to us… Experiences that hurt us. I call it the locked box."

" Ok." She said softly.

" Well,… Someone like Erik… He has so much pain in his past that, its like a static noise in the back of his mind all the time, I don't think he really even notices its there any more… But… The thing is… I can feel it. I can tune it out, most of the time. But when he's around her… It's… Different, theres something buried very deep in him that seeing her calls up to the surface. It's… Very painful but he… I don't understand it… He seeks out her company, he wants to be around her even though it's agonising Raven." He looked her in the eye and she had no doubt he meant it.

Raven's eyes widened. " What happened to him?"

Charles voice was a whisper " I don't know… I keep getting a word " Vinnytsia" I don't know what it means and I don't want to know what could do that to him… You understand Raven? He lived though the worst genocide in modern history… He saw his mother die… Was tortured but nothing comes close to this…"

" You have to learn to block it then. There's no way around it." Said Raven. " You haven't had this problem in years Charles..."

" I know. The first time it took me by surprise. But after that, I should have been able to block it easily. But Lately…" He sighed. " I just feel, raw, open. I have almost no control, and it's getting worse, you see its not just him anymore. It's everyone. I can't seem to filter anymore!"

Raven's heart sank. She knew he'd been depressed recently but she had no idea it was affecting his abilities so profoundly. He didn't suffer like this unless he was under incredible stress. The last time, that she knew of, was just after his mother died.

" Raven…" He whispered. " How am I going to help a school full of children with mutations when I can't even manage my own?" He murmured, staring at the dashboard.

" Charles…" She said softly. " I'm so sorry. I should have seen this sooner… How long has this been going on? "

" Since we moved back. "

Grimm understanding began to dawn on her. Something at the edge of her awareness was nudging her in a way she didn't like. She felt suddenly nauseous.

" Charles… Maybe… Maybe it's not just Erik's reaction to Angie that you're feeling… You know your own feelings can colour your perceptions… When you're not in control."

He nodded slowly, still refusing to look at her. "Yes, the thought has occurred to me. As I said, the past is a powerful thing, and moving back seems to have b… broken open my own locked box." His composure was beginning to crack the closer to the truth he got.

" Oh God Charles!" She whispered, almost under her breath. As though by speaking the words she was cursing them both.

"I can't help it." He murmured.

" I know." " I… I'm sorry." Her voice became small and childish despite herself. " I'm sorry."

He reached out and took her hand. " Don't… It wasn't your fault… It was never your fault."

She didn't reply, There was so much she wanted to say and couldn't. Finally she looked him in the eye and asked:

" Was it worse… Than the stuff I knew about?"

He looked away, at the park, at the playground. He squeezed her hand, unable to reply. She knew though…Part of her always had known. She swallowed around the lump in her throat. Somewhere on the playground a child screamed.

" Thank you." She said. " I don't think I ever did thank you."

" You never needed to Raven. It was my own choice."

She shook her head. Grinding the words out between her teeth. " No… It wasn't."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It was Alex's turn to cook dinner, hotdogs and spaghetti again probably, so Hank had the evening off. He wandered around the grounds for a couple of hours, eventually settling down high up in a large tree overlooking the main gate. Raven was nowhere to be found today, neither was Charles. He assumed they'd gone somewhere together, which surprised him a little, things had been amicable between them since the beach but… Different to before. Erik was probably with Angie in the East wing.

Solitude didn't bother him, he was an introvert anyway, but the fact that he couldn't leave the grounds if he wanted to, that he had to hide himself. That was making him crazy. How was he going to live his life like this in the long term? It was going to be impossible. He suddenly envied Raven her disguise, her ability to walk the streets without causing a riot… He liked her a lot, he really did. But how could they have a life together when he was forced to be a recluse for the rest of his days. He was crippled, he realised, by his appearance, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He was lost in thought when he heard the car pull in. He looked down at the driveway and saw Raven get out, then get the chair out of the trunk and help her brother into it. Hank suddenly felt a little guilty for his self pity. Charles didn't look good, he was slumped in the chair. He didn't attempt to wheel himself, allowing Raven to steer him inside. Suddenly worried, he headed back to the house.

The others had gathered in the kitchen. Erik and Raven were wearing overalls, spattered in white paint, having clearly just come from the East Wing. raven was speaking in a hushed tone to Alex and Erik.

"… I think he just needs to be alone at the moment…"

" Whats wrong?" Asked Hank.

" It's Charles." Raven explained in a choked voice. " He's not well… His mutation its… Sensitised at the moment." She was speaking too carefully. " It hasn't happened in years, not since he was a little boy. But it means that his usual filters aren't working and he's picking up a lot more than he usually does. It's… Really painful for him."

Erik frowned. " Why now?" He asked cautiously. " What triggered it?"

" Um…" Raven cleared her throat, pointedly not making eye contact with him. " I don't know." She replied forlornly. " It's been going on for a while, he didn't say anything."

" Can we do anything?" asked Hank.

" I think the best thing we can do is to stay away from him at the moment, and keep our emotions on an even keel, try not to get angry or upset. He'll pick it up and absorb it. Don't read anything violent or dark, he tends to pick up dreams and nightmares too."

A distressing thought occurred to Hank." Any idea how long this will last? I can't imagine he'd do well with two dozen problem children in a couple of week's time."Looking distraught.

She shrugged helplessly.

" Lets eat something, " Alex said. We'll all feel a lot more emotionally stable after some hotdogs right? He irately indicated the table, on which he had laid out the food. Raven smiled at him gratefully and they sat down.

" So how was everyones day?" She asked, trying to keep the mood light. Small talk ensued. Alex picking up his cue and telling them about the various disasters he had in the kitchen that day. Hank couldn't quite bring himself to join in, instead watching the silent game Erik and Angie were playing. He would levitate her fork an inch or two off the table. She hid a small smile as she touched it with the tip of her finger and it fell, despite Erik's best efforts to keep it floating. Switching off his power the moment it touches her skin. Amazing defensive ability really. He wished he could… He was suddenly struck by a thought. Maybe…

His mind wandered though various equations, elements… When he came back to himself. Raven was entertaining Alex with a story about the offensive Westchester snobs that she grew up around. She paused and looked up.

" Hey!” She said, ”Where are Angie and Erik?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Charles' sat in the centre of his room, unable to move. With his head in his hands. The merriment downstairs would usually give him no trouble, only feeling like a vague happy melody in the back of his mind. But right now every moment of surprise or mirth stabbed him with its intensity. There were undercurrents of anxiety too… About him, and there was a stray cat somewhere on the grounds that was hungry and cold. Shit! Just stop! Just… Go to sleep all of you…But that won't help, because you'll all dream and that will be worse and…I hope the professor is all right, what are we going to do if he doesn't recover in time…Whats wrong with him? Was it something I did? Maybe the accident damaged him more deeply than I realised… I should be the one up there suffering… If only I'd known… Charles… I wish I could have done something.

He gasped and groaned as the endless thoughts and emotions assailed him, moving through him. He counted his blessings, at least he could tell whose emotions were whose. He didn't confuse them with his own, even though he was feeling them. Erik's anxiety and Raven's guilt were the loudest, shrillest of them all.

He was so caught up in himself he didn't notice when Angie entered the room. He jumped and cried out in alarm when he looked up and saw her. Wearing her paint stained overalls, carrying a plate with a hotdog on it. She jumped slightly at his exclamation and her spines protruded a quarter inch then retracted immediately. Her control was improving.

" Angie." He whispered… " Sorry I… I didn't hear you."

The child carefully placed the plate on the desk and approached the chair. She took one of his shaking hands and bought it up to her smooth little head. He placed his palm flat against her scalp and suddenly there was silence.

Charles gasped in surprise. " Oh Angie!" He practically sobbed with relief " You turned it off! You clever girl! You turned it off." He lifted his hand and the noise was back in an awful rush. He immediately put it down again.

" Please. " He panted " Please don't…Don't go anywhere, just stay for a moment don't… Don't go anywhere please." She nodded, comprehending his predicament.

He turned at the sound of footsteps. It was Erik. Charles laughed, he was wearing that ridiculous helmet. Charles had thought he'd lost it in the panic at the beach.

"Don't say anything." He smirked. " I'm not sure if this will work. But its worth a try… Don't lift your hand yet!" He removed the helmet, carefully lowering it over Charles' head. " Now lift your hand."

Charles gingerly removed his hand from Angie's head " It works." He whispered. " Thank you…Thank you both." He closed his eyes. Feeling suddenly drained.

" Thank you Angie." Said Erik. The girl nodded and gave Charles' hand another squeeze before leaving the room.

" R..Remarkably perceptive child." Charles murmured.

" Her?" Erik replied. " It was my idea."

" Of course it was." He breathed. " How did you know?"

" Raven explained."

At that Charles opened his eyes, suddenly alarmed. " What did she tell you?"

" That you were having trouble filtering at the moment, that you haven't been in control recently… She didn't say why, if thats what's worrying you, and I'm not asking."

" Aren't you curious?"

" Of course."

" Said the human cypher Mr Lehnsherr. You have some cheek…"

" I said I'm not asking for an explanation Charles." Erik said tersely. " Just… Here let me help you." He pulled his weakly protesting friend out of the chair and helped him into bed. " Just sleep all right? Sleep as long as you need to… And when you wake up we can talk…"

" I don't need to talk." Charles murmured as his eyes fell closed almost instantly.

" Of course you don't." Erik said softly. "Good night my friend."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

That night the lights of the Xavier mansion went out one by one. All except for Hank's lab. He worked late into the night, peering at slides of Angie's blood , he'd taken a sample when he'd examined her on arrival, after spinning it in a centrifuge he extracted the plasma, Pulled it into a syringe and injected a small amount of it into his own hand.

Then he sat back and watched, wide eyed, as the blue fur began to recede.


	6. The Shadow King.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone who has been kind enough to read, review and follow. I give my sincere apologies for not finishing this yet. Its been nearly a year. Severe health problems zapped my creative energy, then, after I had finally finished new chapters my hard drive died and I lost all my work. I was, to say the least, demoralised.
> 
> But now I am starting afresh and will do my best to finish this. It's still an AU after the first film by the way. DOFP and X-Men : Apocalypse never happened.

Angie crouched behind a flowerpot, close to the wall where she couldn't be seen. Erik was chopping logs in the back yard by the wood pile. She normally would have watched him openly. But he was angry. Very angry. The axe was a silver blur, flying at an unnatural speed, spreading wood chips around him like snow. His anger scared her, but right now her curiosity was more powerful than her fear.

Everyone in this house was like a puzzle box, and Erik the most mysterious of all.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It had started at the breakfast table, when a stranger walked into the room. Everyone stood up in shock, started yelling, she didn't know what was going on until Erik said:

" Hank what the FUCK have you done?"

Hank was a person, well, he was normal looking like a regular man. Thin, dark hair, glasses. He looked really worried, ducking his head to avoid looking anyone in the eye.

" Ok…don't freak out ok… Its only temporary…" He had murmured.

Erik had heard enough. He got up and stormed out of the room, almost turning the table over in the process. Angie cringed violently and Alex reached over and touched her arm.

"It's ok." He whispered. "He's just upset, he'll do some damage to some logs outside and feel better."

After the yelling died down, Hank had explained to Angie, Raven and Alex that he had created a serum from her blood sample, and tested it on himself. He said that her ability to deactivate mutant powers was in her chromosomes or something… And that, with her help, he could create medicine.

Angie thought the idea was a little creepy, her blood being injected into someone else's body. And if Erik didn't like it she wasn't sure she should be helping Hank, but she had nodded nonetheless when he asked her. He said it might help the professor by turning off his ability "Just for a while, until he's more stable." He said.

Angie pointed to the doorway.

" Eric?" asked Raven, sighing deeply. "He believes we should embrace and encourage our abilities. Not turn them off. And you know, I'm inclined to agree with him. " She eyed Hank, a little testily.

" Well that all very well Raven when said abilities aren't crippling you or making it impossible for you to leave the house. " He snapped.

" Yeah… I get that Hank. Believe me. But For Erik… Its an ideological thing. You know that. He was never gong to be ok with this."

" Well it's not up to him! He looks like a normal person. Has no idea what its like to be publicly vilified and attacked for something you can't…" Hank trailed off, looking suddenly ashamed. " Well Shit." he said quietly, as if to himself. " I guess the ideological would be personal for him wouldn't it?"

Raven put her head in her hands and Alex looked awkward.

Angie wondered if she was the only person at the table who didn't know what "ideological" meant and if that meant she was stupid, or if it was an adult word, like the swear words Hank and Erik had used. Which she knew they wouldn't have said in front of her if they hadn't been upset.

Hank got up. "I'd better go talk to him."He said softly, before leaving the room.

" You'd be better off leaving him alone for now!" Raven called after him. But he didn't listen to her. Raven turned to Alex and said a bunch of stuff Angie didn't understand about a war and enemies and Cuba.

Angie slipped away from the table too, and followed Hank.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hank rounded the opposite corner of the house. He cleared his throat and Erik paused in his chopping and turned around.

"WHAT?" He yelled, The head of the axe vibrated visibly. " What the HELL do you have to say to me, traitor?"

" Erik…" Hank raised his hands in his usual defensive way. " I understand why you're angry…"

" Do you?" Erik replied with steely calm. " Please enlighten me."

" Erik, its only a temporary fix."

" FIX?" Erik shouted. " A FIX? When did you decide you needed fixing? Maybe you should turn us all over to the human scientists who'd like to fix us all permanently? Do you have ANY idea what you've done?"

Hank took another step back, he was doing his best to maintain eye contact with Erik and failing miserably. His voice shrunk, he sounded like a scolded child.

" I'm not going to allow the serum out of the lab Erik. I swear to God, no one will get their hands on it, if that what you're worried about."

" It's not about that and you know it… We have had to FIGHT for our right to be who we are Beast! We don't deny our true natures! Not to pander to THEM…"

Erik was shaking with barely repressed violence. Angie didn't think she'd ever seen anyone so angry… Not even Daddy.

" I'm not doing that Erik…" Hank tried to explain.

Erik shouted right over him. " I thought you lot were finally breaking away from the pathetic self loathing! The desire to conform to the oppressors ideals! I must have been stupid to…"

" STOP IT!" Hank screamed. And for a second Angie thought she could see a hint of the Beast inside. He was shaking too.

" Stop, stop it! Just… Listen to me! Just…"

He was looking Erik straight in the eye now. His own shining with angry tears. Erik was silent. She could see he was still enraged but there was a look of surprise there too.

" Erik, you can walk around and no one knows! I can't leave the estate! I'm a FREAK to them. I know you want us to be "out and proud" but thats not the world we live in! I thought you of all people would understand that!"

Erik's rage seemed to subside a bit, but the suspicion in his voice grew.

" Whats that supposed to mean?"

" You know what I mean Erik… You know what its like, don't pretend you wouldn't have torn that star off your jacket if you could've."

Erik was silent for a long time. Then he turned his back on Hank and started chopping again. Hank grimaced.

"Erik Please…"

" Get out of my sight Hank." He muttered. But the rage was gone. Just a horrible resigned acceptance that was somehow worse.

Angie watched him for a long time, the rhythmic blows of the axe falling and falling until he finally dropped it and stood silently, staring at the ground. Then she crept out and went over to him.

He put out a hand and she took it. She thought that maybe he'd known she had been there.

" You have to learn to fight them Angie." He said softly. " In this life. You have to defend yourself, because no one else will, because the battle never really ends."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

That afternoon Charles woke to psychic silence. No chattering of other minds in the house, no swells of emotion in the Ether. Not even the simple thoughts of the mice in the walls that were his constant background noise.

At first he panicked. It was deeply unnerving. Then he remembered the helmet. The previous night. How overwhelmed he'd been.

_Shit._ Erik had seen him at a very low point. Erik was not a man who let sleeping dogs lie. At least not when they were Charles' dogs.

He slowly lifted the helmet off his head, allowing the world to seep back in. He closed his eyes and put his shields up. It worked this time, he smiled. Rest, that was what he had needed. He could hear the vague chattering of the household, but unless he focused on individual voices he wasn't getting the full whack.

He began his morning routine. Which, like his evening routine, Involved checking up on everyone in his little family one by one.

Alex, Raven and Hank were missing from the mansion. The silence, and ease with which he managed his shielding, was suddenly explained. He wondered where they'd gone, particularly Hank, who couldn't leave in daylight for fear of people seeing him.

He tried for Angie… As usual there was a conspicuous vacuum of silence around Angie. It felt so strange to him, to see someone and not feel them. She's like a sad little statue of a child, he thought. But her ability had given him pause. It had the potential to be as powerful and dangerous as his own. She would need training. He knew wherever she was she wouldn't be far from Erik…

Erik…He focused on the cogs of Erik's metallic mind, running fast and hot somewhere on this floor. He was reading.

_"In front of their house there was a courtyard where there stood a juniper tree. One day in winter the woman was standing beneath it, peeling herself an apple, and while she was thus peeling the apple, she cut her finger, and the blood fell into the snow."_

He was reading to Angie. from her book of folktales. He could remember that story, he wondered briefly why Erik was reading such a horrific story to her. He dug a little deeper… Even though he knew he shouldn't… Erik was…

_Unhappy, too much thought… The battle never ends… I can fight and fight and they still don't understand what's at stake… We learned nothing… Nothing. Maybe Charles is right…People… Human or mutant… The same under the skin… Hopeless… Corrupt… Weak…Cruel._

_My mother, she killed me,_

_My father, he ate me…_

The pain, under other circumstances, would be nothing Charles couldn't handle. But the locked box in Erik's mind was rattling and that was rattling his own. An intense feeling of despair was descending on him from both Erik's maudlin state and his own memories. _No hope, no use fighting… Just give in. Give yourself away…_

_Charles had once thought of hanging himself from the rafters in the attic._

He inhaled sharply. That was something he hadn't thought about… Not since the fire. He had repressed that memory. That was a memory from inside the box. He shuddered. The lock was breaking and soon all the darkness would flood out and into the halls of the house. Or, God forbid, into the minds of his family.

Nonononono! You can pull yourself together! You can! You can do this. He told himself. Even in this house. Even here…

_Even here_

_In the house where you suffered and despaired. Where you failed… Where you gave up and gave in…_

_In the house when the walls caved in on you, and the French polish blistered with heat. Where you felt the flames licking at your flesh. Where you were so afraid that you…._

_My mother, she killed me,_

_My father, he ate me..._

NO! NO! NO!

He hadn't realised he'd been crying aloud. Hadn't heard the footsteps running down the hall or his door opening, or anything else until he opened his eyes.

"Charles!" Erik was shaking him lightly. "Charles!"

He stared at his friend, whose face was tight and lined with worry. The fear on Erik's face should have been tangible to him, but it wasn't. It was like looking at a painting or statue of a frightened person.

Then he felt the small hand on his forehead. He hadn't even known she was there.

"Angie?" He looked at her. " Thank you." He said softly.

"What happened Charles?" Erik asked, leaning over him as he tried to assess the damage.

"Oh…" He blinked, feeling far away from himself. Detached. " I… I think I'd better put the helmet back on."

Erik nodded, retrieving it from the floor and handing it to Charles, who found his hands shaking too hard to put it on. As Erik assisted him he asked again. "What happened Charles?" Erik's eyes, level with his, afraid. " You screamed. I've never heard you scream like that."

Charles had no answer. He knew he'd beed affected by Erik's emotions, by the story was reading and by his own…His own…

" Angie would you leave us for a moment?" Erik asked her, never taking his eyes off his friend. Angie slipped her hand off his brow. " Thank you." He told her again. The child's expression didn't change. Statue. She left the room.

Erik waited until he heard her light footsteps moving down the hall.

" Speak to me Charles. Say something."

It wasn't a request. Charles opened his mouth but was too shaken up to speak. He felt another wave of panic coming on. Erik knelt down beside the bed and took his hands in his own.

" Breathe." His voice was gentle but firm. Charles focused on it and inhaled deeply. " In… Out… Thats right. Again… In…Out… Good….Thats it…Again…"

It was a while before his heart rate fell, and his mind began to calm.

" I… I'm so sorry Erik… One moment I was fine, then I started feeling my way around the house. As you know my shielding isn't working properly at the moment. But… Honestly… I don't know what that was!"

" I do." Erik told him.

Charles frowned in confusion. " You do?"

"Its got nothing to do with your shielding. I've seen it before, many times…I've felt it in myself." His voice was deliberately calm and he rubbed a circle on the back of Charles's hand. " They used to call it 'Shell Shock' during the war."

" Wh… Why would I have Shell Shock? I haven't been in battle."

Erik raised an eyebrow. " Haven't you?" He paused a moment and scrutinised his friend, searching for something. It made Charles shrink inside. Don't look at me like that.

Erik continued. " They called it Shell Shock because men who had been shelled during the Great War suffered from it. But you know this… And you also know that the symptoms can be caused by many terrible things besides bombings… Do you really think I don't know it when I see it Charles? Think about the places I've been."

" I haven't been…"

" Is it Cuba?" Erik asked suddenly looking both uncertain and heartbroken. "Is part of you still on that beach with a bullet in your spine? Thats it, isn't it? "

Charles sighed. He knew he should have said something earlier. " No Erik. Please… I know we haven't spoken about it , and maybe there are things that we both need to say but..but… You must try an understand… I do actually forgive you… I know you don't believe it but its true."

Erik looked utterly unconvinced.

"So You forgive me every time you get into that chair or need help into the car? Or every time you try to move your legs or look at a flight of stairs? You're right Charles. I don't believe it."

" Erik… It wasn't what happened in Cuba. Not this time…I know that beyond a doubt."

Erik didn't look reassured. " Then what set it off?"

You! Charles thought That bloody fairy tale! Your blasted subconscious pain! This fucking house! My own bloody weakness!

" Nothing was 'set off' Erik." Charles smiled stiffly. " I just need to strengthen my shielding."

Erik stood, suddenly looking intimidatingly tall. But he wasn't angry, not at all. In fact he looked more together and calm than Charles had ever seen him. He wished he could take the helmet off and find out what the man was thinking.

"You need to tell me the truth." He said.

_And have you leave to protect me from your own pain?_ He thought. The idea of Erik leaving terrified him beyond reason, and his impulsive friend was liable to turn tail and run at any time. It wasn't as though he needed to be there. He replied in a tone calculated to start a fight and push his friend further from the truth.

"Oh really? and you're an open book aren't you Erik? You think its as easy as that? 'The truth will set me free?' You're a bloody hipocryte!"

To his everlasting surprise Erik didn't rise to the bait like he thought he would. His friend didn't even look angry, he looked tired.

" My secrets aren't incapacitating me are they? If you can't say it to me then talk to someone else Charles… Do you know Raven is terrified for you? Or that Hank is working on a drug to block your abilities? You'll see the results of that later when they get back from town by the way. Try not to stare." Erik said with no amusement whatsoever.

When Charles didn't reply, Erik leaned forward and spoke slowly, looking him in the eye with a terrible intensity.

"I'm no telepath, but I know you better than you think my friend. Something is going on here" He leaned over and tapped the helmet… "You need to start trusting me again… I know I don't deserve it after what I did to you… But... Please try. I believe we may have more in common than you think."

_This isn't how its supposed to go! Charles scolded silently. You're supposed to shout and storm off and not bring it up again for a while. Charles swallowed a lump in his throat, suddenly understanding Angie's inability to speak._

Erik sighed, then got up and left Charles alone.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

Angie retreated to her room. Feeling a little rejected. She didn't want to go back to the Juniper Tree. That story was dark and gruesome. She had listened because Erik had chosen it and she liked that he wanted to read to her. So instead she reached under her pillow and fished out the secret diary she'd found.

_Today We found a magic carpet and flew over the entire country, the fields and rivers below us were so beautiful, like a patchwork quilt…_

The author narrated a story of wonder, of a boy and a girl who lived in a world of imagination, alone in a huge castle with many hidden rooms. It was simple but beautiful, and a little sad, their quest was always to find their lost father and mother and they never did.

Then one day a dark presence came to the castle. The neat handwriting deteriorated a little.

_An imposter has come… A new king, a false king. He is not our father… He is not…_

Then there were a series of drawings of a shadowy figure, towering over two small helpless children, who cowered together at its feet. The Shadow King.

Angie shuddered violently. She didn't want to turn the page but found herself doing so. This book wasn't fun anymore.

The next page was blank, and after that was a story, not a personal narration like the rest of the book, more like one of her fairy tales.

_Once upon a time, in a castle on the hill, there lived a brother and a sister. And they had no parents… For the King and Queen left one day and never returned._

_The sister was a powerful witch and the brother was wise sorcerer. And together they created beautiful magic. The castle and the gardens, and the fireworks and pictures and music they made were the wonder of the kingdom._

_Then one day the King and Queen returned. Or… At least they looked like the King and Queen but they were not. They were creatures wearing their skin, but underneath the Queen's skin was Emptiness, and the longer she stayed, the more thin and invisible she became. And underneath the King's skin was Fire and Darkness, and every day he grew larger and more solid… As though he fed on the Queen's substance… And together they bought silence to the castle and all the colour went out of the garden._

_Then one day the False Queen disappeared completely, leaving only her crown behind her. Then the Shadow King called the children before his throne._

_He told the boy that since he had no one to feed off now he would have the girl. For she was strong and young and powerful and he wanted that. But as he reached out to take her the boy cried out._

_" Don't eat my sister! She is only small and will only feed you for a singe day, and once she is gone you will be hungry again. I am bigger and more powerful, I can give you sustenance for longer."_

_Then the boy took out a knife and cut off his own finger, and offered it to the Shadow King._

_And that was the first time…_

Angie threw the book across the room and backed up on the bed, until her back hit the wall. Her heart was palpitating and she was breathing fast, spines extended and shivering. She wished she had never opened that horrible book, and never read that awful story… It stirred up something bad inside her. It reminded her of… No! Help! …Things she didn't want to think about.

Who had written it? It was like they understood. Like they knew. She had thought, perhaps, that she was the only one…

She crept over and picked it up gingerly, and hid it under the mattress.

 


	7. 'Aint We Got Fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the responses guys. Feedback encourages the creativity. 
> 
> NB the stories Erik tells Charles in this were told to me by a Holocaust survivor when I was a kid. 
> 
> ErisVanHelsing sorry I didn't mean to erase your kind comment. I accidentally erased the whole chapter and had to replace it. I hope you got my reply.
> 
> I'd just like to let people know that this isn't a C/E slash story. I just take friendship very seriously. ;-) Also... Angst ahoy.

 

_After that day they’d find themselves looking back… Wondering if the events could have been changed or if fate preserved snapshots of their lives for them. To sift through later and learn from them later._

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

By the time they had their fill of the city, Raven, Hank and Alex, were starting to relax. Hank couldn’t remember the last time he’d been out among crowds of people, but his human body and the anonymity it lent him, left him feeling safer than he had in months.

They ended up at the Museum of Natural History towards afternoon, lLooking up at the massive skeleton of a Blue Whale.

“ How does something that size support its own body weight? “ Raven wondered aloud. Hank began to tell her, but she was already looking at a cross section of redwood trunk that took up the entire back wall, from floor to ceiling.

“Man!” Why are we killing all the giant things?” She said to herself.

Hank smiled. Loving how interested she was in every thing and everyone, her fascination always so genuine and real. She was going to be a great teacher. Fearless.

Alex was out by the main entrance talking to a couple of very beautiful, very classy looking girls. They both laughed in unison at something he’d said. After a while he took his leave of the ladies and rejoined them, Smiling broadly.

“Well guess what?” He told them. “ I got us invited to one of the fanciest parties in Long Island tonight!”

“OH?” Raven punched his arm lightly. With huge grin. “How? No offence Alex but you’re a nobody.”

He smirked “ A nobody who can charm the birds out of the trees!” He retorted. “ Hey! Maybe thats part of my power!”

“So Who’s throwing this bash?” Asked Hank “The Great Gatsby?”

“ I dunno!” Shrugged Alex, the reference going over his head. “Its a fundraiser I think, they’re someone’s kids… Anyway they said its a black tie affair… You think theres anything snobby to wear in that attic of yours Raven?”

“ Oh sure! There’s tonnes of old stuff up there… We might have to get creative with a sewing machine though…

“ Think we could get Erik to adjust our seams? He must be a wonder with a needle…”

As they bantered and planned and laughed, Hank realised that for the first time in his young life. He had real friends, and real places to go. He might not have a level five security clearance at the CIA anymore. But he was actually happy.

“ We should be getting back.” Raven said eventually. “ I want to check on Charles.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Hi Bro.”

She smiled at him from the bedroom door. Sorry to see he was still in bed, and looking pale, _weakened._ He wasn’t reading or writing. Just staring at the ceiling.

“ Raven, hello Darling.” He returned a weak smile. “I know that you know how much I hate being called that so I won’t mention it.”

“ You know you look almost as ridiculous as he does in that thing right?” She indicated the metal on his head.

“ Its not a fashion statement. “ He informed her. “ The shields are still shaky I’m afraid.

“ Hey, whatever helps.” She shrugged. “ Have you spoken to Erik about his… Locked Box? Was that what you called it?”

He shook his head. “ That wouldn’t be a good idea.”

“ Why not?”

“ Because.” He paused, uncharacteristically struggling to gather his thoughts. “ He stays here, because he feels guilty about hurting me. If he knew he was making this… _Thing_ worse. He’d be gone tomorrow. And I… I need him here. If he goes, and lets that pain consume him, reverts back to what he was before… It will be the end of him Raven.”

Raven took a deep breath.

“ _Wow_ …I know you’re psychic and all but you can be kinda dense sometimes you know that? it’s no picnic living in a group when you’re used to being alone. Especially for someone with the social skills of a hermit crab. Do you _really_ think He’d be here if he didn’t want to be? If it was just guilt he wouldn’t have stayed. Honestly Charles! How could you think he was only here because of that?”

“ I know it Raven I’ve heard him… Not intentionally, but I've felt his guilt.”

“ Yeah and what else _aren’t_ you picking up on?" She scolded gently. "The fact that hes your _friend_? That he believes in a _future_ for this place? Or did you ever consider that the _one_ thing he wants more than _anything_ else is a place to belong? A family.”

“ Do you think he considers us family?”

“ He had a fight with Hank this morning that pretty much confirms it. You don’t get that mad at someone you don’t care about.”

“Ah! Yes, Hank’s magic potion… What are your feelings on that?”

“ Mine? Well… I don’t like the fact that he has to use it,obviously. But Who am I to deny him some happiness? He can leave the house now. How could I judge him?

“ Does he know its definitely temporary?” Charles asked. “No side effects?”

“ It’s already wearing off. He’s going to have to shoot up again for the party tonight. He hasn’t noticed any side effects yet.”

“ Party? Well, its improved his social life already. Where is this party?” He asked a little accusingly.

Raven laughed. “Charles I’m an adult now remember? I don’t need your permission to attend a party. Its a fundraiser somewhere on Long Island. Alex got us invited...In answer to answer the question I know you want to ask, we’ll be back sometime before 5am… Probably.”

Charles groaned. “ All right, all right, enjoy yourselves, just be careful.”

“ Charles… I can break a man’s neck with one hand. I don’t _need_ to be careful.” She smirked as she sauntered out of the room. “ You really need to stop over thinking things brother.”

“ A sister who thought a little more and acted a little less might help.” He called after her, with a half smile.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

  
“ Its a bad idea.”

“ I knew you’d say that.” Raven grumbled as she rooted through boxes in the attic, kneeling under the sloping roof, Erik leaned against the back wall, levitating a coin through his fingers distractingly.

“ A fundraiser on Long Island? Everyone at this affair would probably love to see your heads mounted in their opulent trophy room.”

Raven rolled her eyes.

“ Thats why we’re going incognito. I’m Madaline Davies- Mason by the way. Of the Cape Cod Davies- Masons. Pleased to meet you, please stay out of our golf club.” She drawled.

Erik smirked. “Be careful. Raven, sometimes the abyss stares back at you.”

“ We’ll be fine Erik. We’re going to give Hank a night out, It’ll be fun.”

“ Hanks making the most of his _disguise_ then? ”

He spoke quietly, clipped. He didn’t look up at her. Not for the first time, she was both surprised and amused by his introversion and awkwardness when it came to expressing his personal feeling in any way that didn’t collapse buildings or destroy warships.

“ Erik… You can’t begrudge him the option of looking normal in public. It’s for his own safety as much as anything.”

“ Safety? You realise he’s helpless as a newborn lab rat now?”

Raven wondered how much of Erik’s anger was fuelled by fear. “Don’t worry Erik, Alex and I will be there, nothings going to happen to him.”

Erik didn’t reply. She took that for confirmation that he was, in fact, worried.

“ I hope they don’t mind wearing a dead guys tuxedos.” She murmured. Finding a likely looking silk shirt.

Erik cleared his throat

“ Raven?”

She looked up meeting his eyes. No longer staring at his feet, he looked pensive, dare she say it…Nervous. if such a thing were possible.

“ What is it Erik?”

“ Can you forgive me for crippling your brother?”

She sat back on her heels. She hadn’t been expecting that. His voice was calm, even, the stare analytical. He wanted the truth, not reassurance.

“J... Jesus _Christ_ Erik.” She stammered. “ What am I supposed say to that? It wasn’t your fault. You know that. I know that, Charles knows that. You would never hurt him deliberately.”

“ Thats not an answer. “

“ That what you’re _getting_!” She snapped. “ I don’t _know_! Ok? I don’t _know_ how I feel about it. I have… _Mixed_ feelings about Cuba… About everyone involved, ok? Why are you even asking me this right now?”

He searched for an answer, finally replying:

“ It’s Charles… He’s not…” He swallowed visibly, she almost cringed at how difficult this clearly was for him. “ He’s not _well.._ Raven.  I think… Maybe I’m making it worse by being here.”

“ _No!_ Don’t you _dare_ Erik!” She sat up straight and stabbed her finger at him. He looked genuinely surprised.

“ Don’t what?”

“ You… You put him in that chair… That’s true. Now you can _damn_ well take responsibility!”

“ So you _are_ angry…” He began.

 She panicked at the thought of Charles, grief-stricken as well as mentally fractured.

“If you left… Erik… it would destroy him, you have no idea. The way he is now… I can’t do it on my own Erik! He _needs_ you here, we _all_ do! What would Angie do without you? This is your place now and you have to decide if you’re in it for the long haul or not! You can't keep him on a knife edge, wondering if you’re really invested or not. ”

“ Raven He’s suffering…”

“ Well thats not _your_ fault!” She cried, then realised she’d said to much. He regarded her with almost reptilian calculation for a long moment.

“ Then whose fault is it? Because what I’m seeing is a man I’m directly responsible for paralysing, curled up in bed in mental agony, barely able to tolerate my presence, and unable to look me in the eye.”

Raven put her face in her hands and sighed deeply, sitting down on the crate. “ Oh god you’re going to make me do this aren’t you?” She said, mostly to herself.” Ok then. OK… It’s partly you… But not the way you think.”

“ What do you mean?”

“ His shielding is pretty much absent right now. He’s like an exposed nerve. It’s happened before. After his mother died, and after the fire he was practically catatonic…I think… I don’t remember much from that time… Sometimes I think… Maybe he did something to make me forget.” She felt a weight lift off her shudders at the admission, she’d never said it out loud before.

“ So why now? If not what happened on the beach then whats causing it?”

She was upset, shaking a little. He didn’t let up, staring her down.

“ He wouldn’t want people knowing. I wasn’t supposed to know either. ”

“ You know I wouldn’t use anything against him.”

“ It’s the house…” She whispered. “ Being back home…. I think he didn’t realise what it would do to him.”

“ He did say something a while back about struggling with memories.” Erik told her. “ He said he was still angry about something.”

She nodded. “It’s partly that, and partly that now he’s feeling everything without a filter. He’s prying into our minds without even knowing he’s doing it, and bumping up against subconscious crap he shouldn’t be looking at.”

“Like?”

“ He said that theres a deep grief in you… That Angie seemed to trigger.”

Erik seemed to freeze for a second, but it passed. His expression giving nothing away.

“ Thats what’s tormenting him?” He asked. “ My subconscious?”

“ No… Well… His own subconscious is the real problem I think. Normally he’d be able to handle other people's pain. The reason it’s tormenting him is that he’s so goddamn distracted by his own stuff that he can’t block it out.”

“ Raven…” He paused, seemingly reluctant to ask the question. “ What happened here before the fire? ”

“ _Jesus_ Erik… I… I can’t remember much… We were lonely kids, we played imaginary games a lot. We were actually kind of happy most of the time.”

“ But some of the time you weren’t?”

“ No some of the time… Kurt would be home.” An unintentional shiver passed through her body, she knew Erik noticed.

“ What kid of man was he?” A simple question. But one that caused Raven to stiffen. Erik kept his voice even and calm. “ Did he hurt you?”

“ Erik… It was nothing, you know, compared to the stuff some people go though.”

“ People like me you mean?”

She gave a shaky sigh. “ I feel silly even saying it in front of you. Well… Like I said it was no big deal. Not compared…”

“ It's not a competition.” He told her. “Tell me.”

She looked across the room at him. His half shadowed face had lost it’s hard edge. He didn’t look like he was judging her.

“ Well… Before I came here. Before I met Charles … Once again… I don’t remember much, but most of what I do remember was worse than anything Kurt did.”

“ And what did Kurt do? ” His voice was calm but something was boiling just under the surface. 

“ Um…” She continued awkwardly “ I think he really resented me, like on some level he knew I wasn’t…Normal… He used to pick me out for every little thing… Not that I was an angel by any means… But… Unreasonably, you know? He’d hit me hard, hand shaped bruises hard…”

Once again she felt stupid for saying it. _The man survived Auschwitz for Gods sake! And you’re whining about getting a few hidings as a kid!_

“ Did Charles know?” Asked Erik.

“ Oh of course! It  _killed_ him, because Kurt never walloped him, only me. Me being the naughty one probably explained that. But Charles was so horrified whenever it happened, even after I explained I’d had worse before I met him… The occasional smack was nothing to me really.” She said, still feeling the need to downplay it even now. She heard Charles’ adolescent voice echoing in her memory. _Don’t say that Raven! It’s not 'nothing!'_

“ Charles used to beg him and try to drag me away from him whenever Kurt grabbed my collar. He used to tell me to hide when Kurt was around. Even though, most of the time, he didn’t do anything to me. Charles hated Kurt, despised the man…Worse than I did, I think.”

“ I can imagine.” Erik said coldly. Probably imagining a tiny, high spirited Raven.

“ Then… After Sharon Died… It was about two weeks after the funeral. He’d been pretty calm until then, pretty much ignored Charles and me and just worked in the lab. Charles, as I said, wasn’t well. He spent lot of time sleeping or just lying in bed. A bit like now."

Raven suddenly found it hard to look Erik in the eye while she spoke.

“One day I was playing in the hallway, running and sliding up and down in my socks… Charles was in bed, Kurt was in the lab as usual. Anyway I crashed into an end table and knocked a huge antique vase down. Smashed it everywhere of course, loudly… So I was sitting there, a little stunned, And… I guess I’d had a shock. I remember Charles running over to me and he was terrified! He was yelling at me….I didn’t realise I’d reverted back to my true form, just for a second too long… Kurt came ‘round the corner and saw… He didn’t say anything, just watched as I changed back.

I was sure he’d take of his belt and wail the tar out of me, but he just stood there. Charles put himself between us and stared at him. They stayed like that for a while, like they were having a psychic conversation. I remember Charles was shaking… Suddenly Kurt smiled and… It was the most sinister smile I’ve ever seen.”

She took a deep breath as though resurfacing from a pool. Gulping around a sudden tightness in her throat.

“Charles didn’t have real control of his ability then, not in a way that could manipulate a mind like Kurt’s…But…Something happened in that moment. I think they made a deal… Because after that…" Her voice broke… "He didn’t hit _me_ any more…”

Unaware he had crossed the room. She jumped as Erik knelt beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder.

“ Only Charles.” He said.

“ Only Charles…" She whispered.  "Never in front of me…I used to follow him everywhere, try and provoke Kurt to distract him from Charles, but it was like I didn’t exist. He’d follow Kurt into the lab and… I wasn’t allowed in there…I don’t know what Charles did or said to him that day but… If Kurt was home, Charles was hurt…”

“A scientist with a mutant at his mercy.” Erik whispered. "Do you know what he did to him? 

She shook her head. “He’d keep it quiet but I could tell when something had happened… Even though he hid the injuries from me, there were bruises sometimes..But mostly I think they were in places that didn’t show…He’d disappear into hiding places around the house, he’d spend hours in the bathroom, then he’d reappear and pretend nothing had happened, that he was fine. And I… I pretended to believe him… God Help me!”

“Raven…”

“NO! Erik… I should have told someone. I should have…”

“ Raven.” He grasped her ams and turned her to face him. “ You were a child and all you had on Earth was Charles… _Who_ could you have told?”

She fell silent, having no answer. He pulled her into a brief, awkward hug.

“ I think I understand a little better now.” He said.

“ Don’t tell him I told you.” She whispered.

“ Neither of you have anything to be ashamed of.” Erik Told her. “ But I won’t, if that what you want.”

“ Thank you.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

By the time the evening Rolled around, the serum had worn off, with no discernible side effects. Hank injected another dose. And waited for it to take effect.

Alex pressed the suit Raven had found for him, thinking of the beautiful girls from earlier.

Raven ‘put on her makeup’. She changed the colour of her hair to an almost indigo shade of black, creating a new persona for a WASP filled ballroom. She finished it off with a silver gown.

Erik paced his room, thinking about how people are like maps without keys or legends. And the more you try to figure them out the more confusing they become. Until one day you find that missing legend with the symbols and colours explained… And suddenly you understand.

Charles lay in bed, his hands curled around the edges of the helmet, which blocked external noise but did nothing for his ugly memories, slowly bleeding back into his brain.

And Angie? Angie lay on her bed reading a book, written before she was born, by a child not much older than herself.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Alex whistled as he drove the car through the massive gates, to a waiting valet at the end of a very long avenue.

“ Who the hell are these people?” He breathed. “Even the gravel in the driveway looks expensive.”

“ Didn’t you get a name?” Asked Raven

“ Hell, two beautiful rich girls were asking me out. I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth.”

“ Good point.”

They were ushered into the mansion, about three times the size of the Xavier homestead, by a Butler. Orchestral music issued out into the large marble pillared entrance hall.

“I’m about to feel hopelessly middle class aren’t I?” Whispered Hank. Raven chuckled.

“Just remember your cover story Hank McAllister of the Fairfield Conetticut McAllisters.”

The girls: Daisy, a statuesque blonde and Molly, a small redhead, had evidently been warned of their arrival and were there to greet them .

“ Oh we’re so glad you could come!” Molly declared as she air kissed Alex, then lightly offered her hand to Hank and Raven. “ We’re the only people here under fifty!”

They were sisters, children of the famous Astor family. Both girls were pleasant and outgoing. They thought they were being very rebellious by inviting outsiders from Manhattan to the party. The three young mutants followed them as they entered the ballroom and milled through the crowd of polite, well dressed aristocrats, sipping champagne as they went.

Molly complimented Raven’s, unusual gown.

“Why _thank you_ … It’s from Paris!” Raven laughed.

The sisters made jokes about how stuffy and old everything was. Raven was in her element, talking to strangers, making up relations and writing branches onto her family tree that connected her to the Cabots and Roosevelts by marriage. Alex was enjoying just watching her. Occasionally chipping in with his own anecdotes about this cousin or that uncle. But mainly flirting with the girls. Hank stayed quiet, not that he wasn’t having fun, but he was somewhat uncomfortable with the pretence, even if it was just for the evening.

“ It’s awfully slow” Daisy commented yet again. “I do wish they’d start dancing!”

“ Oh! Here comes the Governor for his speech!” Whispered Molly. “Once thats over the party can start properly. “

Raven was about to begin a spectacular lie that linked her heritage to the Habsburg Emperors of Austria, when the music stopped and Hank gripped her arm like a vice. She turned to him with a bitten of snarl and saw that he was pale as a sheet and staring at the musician’s stage. A middle aged man and woman stood behind a podium. The man was smiling and tapping on his champaign glass.

“ Ladies and Gentleman.” Martha and I are delighted to see such a turnout for our cause. We offer sincere thanks to each and every one of you for attending, and for your kind contributions. Thanks especially to the Astor family for the venue. As you know, this is a cause close to our hearts.”

He cast his eyes at the ground, and reached for his his wife's hand. The woman’s bottom lip wobbled.

“Our own daughter Angela suffers from a rare genetic illness, for which she is now institutionalised.”

A sad hush fell over the room with the occasional whisper breaking the silence.

_“ That poor woman…”_

_“ Imagine if one of ours…”_

_“ There but for the grace of God…”_

“But with _your_ help, with the help of the cream of America’s medical community and with every financial contribution, every silent partner joining the board, every investment, we come closer to finding a cure for her, and indeed, for other genetic abnormalities that cause such suffering.”

Another man, presumably Mister Astor, Molly and Daisy’s father, ascended the stage and shook hands with the gentleman.

“ Thank you Governor Fisk, Mrs Fisk. ” I’m sure that people will dig deep to help you out, and that you’ll be happy to answer questions if they have them. With the right investors… We can make this thing happen. ”

“ Quite.”

Astor went on to elaborate on the plan for his new private facility, where only the most elite and groundbreaking medical research would take place. There, he said, they would spearhead cures for every epidemic and weakness that had ever plagued mankind. He told them just how hard they were working to find a cure for undesirable genetic traits and defects, like the ones afflicting poor little Angela Fisk…. Then he left the stage with a request that everyone enjoy their evening.

Raven tried to hide her shock, and did a better job of it than Alex, who was white as a sheet and biting though his lip, and Hank, who was still gripping her arm hard enough to bruise, watching every move the men made as they left the stage and meandered into the crowd.

“ Well fuck me.” She murmured under her breath. “ Did we ever walk into the wrong party.” Hank slowly nodded beside her. “ You can let go of me now.” She told him.

“ Sorry.” He murmured, “ What the _hell_? Raven I think you should follow them, wherever they’re going.”

Raven nodded. “You and Alex distract Dad Astor…” She replied, her eyes never leaving Fisk.

“ Oh Alex!” Daisy called, you must waltz with me! Come!” Alex looked pleadingly at Hank.

“ Umm… Daisy?” Hank asked awkwardly. “I wonder… Would you be able to introduce us to your father? We’re studying medicine you see…We’d love to hear more about his foundation. ”

“ Oh… How _boring_! “ She moaned “ _Really_? You too?” She asked Alex.

Alex nodded. “Just for five minutes?” He pleaded, flashing his most charming grin. “Then I promise I’ll dance with you all night.”

Hank kept an eye on Raven as she slipped behind a pillar and walked out the other side a perfect facsimile of Mr. Astor.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

She saw Fisk out of the corner of her eye. He was speaking with a group of people. There was no way she’d be able to speak candidly to him. But his wife was standing by his side, looking utterly miserable. Wishing she could remember either of their first names, she strode up and placed a hand on Fisk’s shoulder. Resisting the urge to squeeze until his bones cracked.

“ Excuse me…” She picked the nearest Jay Gatsby reference that fell out of her brain. “ Old Sport.”

“ Abe!” Fisk replied. “ I was just telling these ladies and gentlemen about how close we are to getting to a cure for our poor Angie.”

“ Ah! Yes, every day a little closer.” She knew she didn’t have long. “ Listen Old Sport may I borrow your lovely wife for a moment?” She asked, taking the woman’s arm.

“ Oh, yes of course.” Fisk said, turning back to his audience, clearly he couldn’t care less. Raven walked with the woman, leading her out of the ballroom and into an alcove in the hall.

“ So…” She searched her memory and took her best guess. “ Martha…” The woman didn’t react, so Raven assumed she’d gotten it right. “ You’re not enjoying your evening.”

The woman began to cry, opening her diamante purse,  taking out a hankie and wiping her eyes delicately. “ Oh Abel!” She sniffed. “ I just… I need you to _talk_ to him.”

“ Talk to him?”

“ Richard.” _File under names_ thought Raven

“ About?”

“ About this whole idea! I’m having second thoughts Abe! I… I’ve been re-evaluating things and I’m… No I’m just not happy with it. “

“ What aspect of it?” Raven asked, nonplussed.

“ This treatment for Angie. Can’t she just stay at that school? A private school in Westchester… A good, respectable lie. But Richard thought word would get out that something was wrong with her. There were already pictures of her without hair floating around in the papers…”

The woman looked up at her, eyes bloodshot, but somehow distant, her face twisted with with effort of expressing herself. She was swaying slightly.

_I know that look._ Raven thought of Sharon Xavier. _You’re tranquilized to within an inch of you life right now you silly bitch._

“ But I could live with that, just calling the school a hospital or institution for sick children… But… Well… I don’t like the idea of putting her in a _real_ one.”

“ A real..?”

“ Insitution! the facility. I mean, I know Richard’s scientists need to have her there to find a cure for her but… I don’t like it Abe. She’s a child. She’s My child and I don’t want her locked up somewhere underground in a secret location for God knows how long… Having untested medical treatments! ”

Raven didn’t know how to reply. Her blood was running cold. Her heart drumming in her chest. _Medical Treatements… Private Facility…_ This was exactly what Erik warned them about.

“ Oh _please_ Abe! Don’t be angry with me!” Martha Fisk sounded genuinely contrite. “ I know you’ve put in all this effort to fund the project, and that you were waiting for someone like her to become available… But… Ca't you find someone _else?_  

“ No… No Martha I’m not angry. I’m just wondering what… Richard will think of all this.”

“ Oh you know Richard. He won’t stop until she’s back to her old self. He doted on her. He was so devastated after it happened. It was like he’d lost the love of his life.” She sounded bitter. “ I never liked like the way he spoiled that child honestly. He never showed me attention like that even before we were married.”

“ Did you talk about this with him? Did you tell him you want her to stay at the school?” Raven wanted to scream.

  
“ Oh I say what I’m told to say!  I don’t get an opinion on these things! He won’t listen to me!” Martha said angrily.

Scrambling for ideas Raven blurted out:

“ Well… You know Martha… Sometimes a man needs to be… Motivated. He’s a politician…You know what he wants to avoid most in the world? Scandal.”

“ Scandal?’ sniffed Martha.

“ Indeed. Now Martha. All men have something to hide… And I think we both know that… _Dick_ … has more than most. Don’t tell me there aren’t things you could make public that could… _Persuade_ him to see your side of things.”

“ You’re asking me to blackmail him? Sullying my own good name by association? I can’t do _that_! Please… Talk to him Abe?”

“ Oh I’ll try my dear…” Raven looked over Martha’s shoulder and, to her horror saw the real Abel Astor walking towards the alcove…

“I make no guarantees. You know how stubborn he can be, especially when it comes to his little girl… I must run…” She slipped out of the alcove and behind one of the marble pillars, leaving Martha utterly confused.

“ Ah Martha! There you are!” She heard the real Astor boom. “ Dick’s looking for you!”

“ But… You were…” The confused women murmured to herself as she was led away by the elbow.

“ There there…A little too much to drink?” Astor patronised her.

Raven crouched behind the pillar, breathing like she’d just run a marathon.

Oh God! Oh God! She whimpered. We have to get out of here!”

As she made her way back to the last place she’d left the boys she thought: _What kind of mother is jealous of her own daughter? Her own daughters relationship with her husband no less?_ She felt sick. Did the woman _really_ care at all about Angie being experimented on? Or was she just afraid that a “ Cure” might find Angie living at home again? Either option didn't look good for the little girl.

  
xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

At 9pm Erik gave up hope that Charles would come down for dinner.

He, floated a tray up the stairs, on the way he stopped into Charles’ study and picked up the chess set. He looked at the disarray of books and papers that littered the office and wondered how someone with a mind like Charles could stand such disorder. Myabe his friends natural state was one of perpetually sorting through mental clutter, and the real stuff didn’t bother him.

He opened the door silently. Charles was curled up on the bed, his head almost touching his knees.

“ Knock.” Erik said redundantly. Charles looked up. He couldn’t make the effort to smile. His features drawn with exhaustion, his eyes red.

“ Hello Erik.” He murmured. “Is everything all right?”

“ Everything except you.” He replied, sitting down in Charles' chair, in its usual place by the bedside. “ Here.” He reached out and, to Charles clear alarm, he removed the helmet and floated it on his own head.

“ W…” Charles uncurled and tried to sit up, rubbing his head “What are you doing?”

“ Making things easier.” Erik replied with a small smile. “ Now when we play you won’t be able to _cheat._ ” He held up the chess board.

“ Oh.” Charles looked confused, he pulled himself backwards against the headboard and into a sitting position.

“ But first...”

“ Oh dear.”

“ No..” Erik raised his hand. “Wait.” He floated the tray onto Charles’ lap. On it was a plate of toast and a enamel mug of tea.

“ Oh Erik, Really, You shouldn't have, I’m not…”

“ First you’ll eat the toast and drink the tea.”

His tone brooked no argument. Charles sighed and bit into a quarter of the tost. Erik had cut his fast into quarters for him. Something about that amused him.

“ Then we’ll play.” Erick balanced the board on the bed and began to set up the pieces.

“ You’re good at this.” Charles admitted, sipping his tea.

“ At what?”

“ Blackmail.”

Erik snorted. “When I want to blackmail you you’ll _know_ it. This is basic nursing.”

Charles choaked a little on his tea at the thought or Erik as a nurse.

“ No really,” he said, without irony, “I’m a decent nurse, in fact, after liberation…”

Charles braced himself, instinctively, for a flood of horrific images related to the camps. Mercifly the helmet did its job. He was surprised then. Erik had never voluntarily shared stories of that time with him… Or anyone else, to his knowledge.

“I was in the Red Cross hospital in quite a state, as I’m sure you can imagine, from starvation and disease and… Shaw…” Erik flinched almost imperceptibly as he said the name. “My injuries were such that I was immobilised for a while, with a half body cast…”

Charles shuddered. _Where are you going with this my friend?_

“ And of course like everyone else in that hellhole I also has Typhus. Not a severe case… I say not severe… Not as severe as many others. But I was transferred to one of the women and children’s fever tents. I was the only child in that particular tent, and I was, of course, fawned over by the nurses.”

“ You must have hated that.” Charles observed.

“I didn’t feel anything about anything back then.” Erik responded briskly. “ I can remember the sounds, the smells, the phsyical sensations… But for the life of me, I don’t remember how I _felt_ …”

Erik frowned, as though trying to call up his lost emotions. _Stolen by the horrors of that place_ , thought Charles. _You cut them off to survive._

“Anyway” He continued “Beside me was an old woman who couldn’t… Or wouldn’t eat. The doctors were preparing to lose her. One more among the thousands who died after liberation. There were so many others to worry about... But for some reason I decided she would live… So I made her eat.”

“ How?” Charles asked, astounded by Erik’s personal disclosure.

Erik smirked. “ I stole her cigarette ration and hid them in my cast.”

“ You _ransomed_ her cigarettes?”

“ Half a smoke every time she ate a bowl of soup. She was so weak I had to feed her, then hold the thing to her lips.”

“ Did she live?”

“ She did. Took me home with her after we recovered.”

“ So you lived with her?”

Erik didn’t reply, he had a far off look in his eye.

“ Thats enough remimnicing for now.” He said briskly. “ Finish that toast.”

Charles did as he was told, wondering what prompted his friends sudden penchant for storytelling. As they started their game he couldn’t help but wonder if Erik was trying to manipulate him somehow. Then felt bad for thinking it. He was grateful for the distraction of the game. And Erik didn’t pressure him to talk. Just played the game with his usual focus. For the first time in weeks Charles' mind began to empty, he became immersed in the game. All other thought blessedly absent.

He was so focused that it was Erik who noticed Angie standing in the doorway not him.

Erik looked up at her shuffling.

_“Libling?_ ”

Charles heard the Yiddish endearment trip off his friend’s tongue quicker than thought. Something stabbed at his nerves and skittered out to the edges of his concousness, only to be lost in the synapses of his frayed mind. The child was in her nightclothes. Raven had picked them out, yellow polkadots. She was clutching her toy rabbit, Her face pale. Her baldness made her eyes look even bigger than they already were. She was grinding her teeth violently.

“ Did you have a nightmare Angie?” Erik asked her. She nodded, hesitantly. “Come here.” He patted the bed.

She sat, cross legged on top of the bedspread beside Charles.

“ Stay and watch us play chess for a while.” Charles said, smiling weakly. Not knowing how to help her while so thoroughly locked out of her mind.

They continued, She watched with solemn eyes, she clearly knew how to play. Inhaling slightly at crucial points in the game.

“ Can you play chess Angie?” Charles asked her, She nodded. “ Well then you can play the winner.” He told her. If she was pleased by this he couldn’t tell. Soon her eyelids became heavy and her head nodded. She fought sleep, eyes starting open seconds after they closed. If he had been able to, Charles would have touched her head and sent her into a dreamless sleep.

“ Time for bed?” He said softly. She yawned and nodded a few times. Before sliding off the bed and shuffling for the door.

“I’ll keep the light on in the hallway.” Erik told her. She nodded again and wandered back to her bedroom.

“ Should we… I don’t know… Tuck her in or read to her or something?” Whispered Erik. “Bedtime is usually Raven’s department.”

“ She’ll be fine…She doesn’t like adults in her room at night.” Charles explained, avoiding eye contact.

They sat in silence for some time, considering the board intently.

“ She won’t though.” Charles said quietly, almost to himself. “ She won’t be fine, ever again.”

Erik eyed him with concern. “ What do you mean?”

Charles moved his queen, leaving his king in check. Erik pretended not to notice.

The nightmares, the tooth grinding, even the mutism may improve over time with the right care. But there are deeper problems there.”

“I thought you couldn’t read her?”

“ I don’t need to. I have eyes in my head!” Snapped Charles. “ Do you know what she asked me the morning after we bought her here?” Charles’ hand shook slightly on his rook. “ I explained that she was safe, and that she was staying… And she wrote to me… _“ What do I have to do?”_ Then she underlined it twice when I tried to explain… _“What do I have to do?_ ” She didn’t believe me when I said we had no alterior motives… That she didn’t have to… Perform any _services_ to be allowed to stay here!” He spat the words as though they tasted bad. “ She was willing though… To do _absolutely_ anything to stay here and be away from home! A child that age Erik… Thinking like that!” He stabbed his finger down against the board.

Erik hadn’t known about that. Something coiled around his guts at the though of the child. Sleeping in her bed down the hall, defenceless, _She doesn’t like adults in her room at night._ How had Charles known that? 

He regarded his friend. Charles had a tremor in his jaw as he spoke, he had put down his rook and was clutching the blanket in a white knuckled fist.

“ What do you think she meant by it?” Erik asked. Observing how the muscle beside Charles’ eye twitched as he looked absolutely anywhere except Erik.

“ You _know_ what she meant!” He whispered harshly. “You know first hand what its like to be a child betrayed by adults, that trust doesn’t repair once its broken.”

He looked sadder than Erik had ever seen him.

“ No Charles…” He said softly. “ I never had my trust broken.”

Charles looked genuinely surprised by that.

“ Bullshit.” He said.

“ No… Not Bullshit.” Erik wasn’t angry or upset, although Charles was coming apart more by the second.

“It’s a common misconception people have, about people like me.” Erik explained. “ Closely followed by the idea that I can’t feel sympathy for others if their suffering doesn’t equal my own… It’s peculiar… They think that what I went though in Auschwitz made me less able to empathise. Instead of giving me more insight into suffering and more patience for it.”

Charles had to think about that for a moment. He sat back and stared at his friend.

“ That… That would make sense.” Charles concluded. But _how_ can you say you weren’t betrayed?”

“ Oh I never said that.” Erik grimaced darkly. “ I was betrayed sure enough. First by my government, then my neighbours. But the Gestapo who arrested us and herded us onto the train… The SS… The Commandant… The Capos… They didn’t betray me. I knew from the outset what they were. There for the destruction of my people. It was their job to abuse and torment and kill. I had a healthy distrust of them and creatures like them… But even at the worst…

He realised he’d been rambling more than he meant to. Casting a glance at Charles he found his friends eyes glistening with tears. His iron grip on the blanket had loosened a little though. Erik maintained eye contact with difficulty as he finished his thought. Because Charles needed to hear it.

“ Even at the worst times… In Shaw’s laboratory…” He struggled to keep his voice calm and words clear.” When I was begging for death… I held onto the trust I had for my parents. I knew, you see, that they loved me, always. I never doubted that they’d be there in the afterlife. I’d see Mama and Pape, and all the Aunts and Uncles and cousins and Bobe and Tate, and be embraced… I knew I didn’t deserve to be treated the way I was treated… Because I was never betrayed by people who were supposed to love me. I was let down in every way imaginable. But _never_ in the place where my soul lived… Never in the way that _counted.”_

Charles nodded in understanding. A tear dripping off his chin. 

  
“ So you see my friend. How could I possibly judge someone who was hurt like that? By someone who should have protected them?”

_Please speak to me Charles. Let it out._ He thought, wishing he could remove the helmet and absorb some of his friend’s agony.

 

There was a sound from downstairs. Voices, The others were back from their party. A lot earlier than expected/ They didn’t sound happy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	8. Into Night.

Angie slept for all of a few minutes before the nightmare came.

_At first she didn’t know she was dreaming, because she was lying in her bed. But a strange oppressive feeling surrounded her. The door opened, letting in a shaft of light. She instinctively tensed up… But it wasn’t a man shaped shadow that appeared against the light. It was not much taller than her._

_The boy stepped into the half light of her room. He was thin, pale, sensitive looking. With sandy hair and sad eyes. He wrung his hands, distraught._

_“ Please!” He reached out to her. His voice obscured, inside her head he never moved his lips. “ Please won’t you help me?”_

_She tried to sit up but she was somehow stuck to the pillow. She tried to speak but nothing came. She reached out to him from where she lay, he was becoming hysterical._

_“Please…Someone!” He began to sob. “ Please won’t someone help me!” He looked over his shoulder at the doorway. Then right at Angie, right into her._

_“ He’s coming!” He gasped in terror._

_Something dark blotted out the sliver of light. The boy was swallowed by it._

She woke to the darkness of her room. For a while she couldn’t move, frozen in fear. Her spines extended, poking holes in the sheets. She wanted nothing more than to hide. But how could she hide from something that wasn’t real? Not real, not real, she repeated in her head and she grabbed her rabbit from under her pillow and squeezed it. The spines slowly retracted. She felt sick, dirty, she had an overwhelming urge to bathe herself but couldn’t stand the thought of being naked.

 _Whats wrong with me?_ She wondered. Erik had told her that she had switched her feelings on again. She wanted the off switch. Because before she was numb. But now she felt like she was covered in viscous black tar that wouldn’t wash off.

She didn’t want to be alone, but she wanted to hide away. She felt disgusting, she didn’t want anyone to see her. Eventually the darkness became too much and her desire for company won out. Swinging her legs over the high edge of the bed she jumped to the floor, launching into a run to the door before anything could reach out from under the bed and grab her ankles.

The hallway light was on, she wandered up the long corridor, bare feet silent on the rug. All the doors were closed, was everyone in bed already? She sighed with relief when she saw The Professor's door was open. She crept over and peeked in. Erik and Charles were playing chess. Erik was sitting in the wheelchair beside the bed, and Charles was propped up against his pillows. He didn’t look well, worse than that morning. She didn’t want him to hurt. He had pulled her out of that cupboard, he had bought her here. He was kind and his voice wasn’t loud and he was a gentleman… Gentle…Man… And when people were around him they became more gentle too. Erik didn’t look like the same person he was that morning, shouting, chopping, shaking with high emotion. He looked up and saw her.

"Libling?"

She didn’t know what the word meant but she knew it meant her. His eyes were sad.

" Did you have a nightmare Angie?"

 _Yes…_ She nodded. She wondered for a moment if she would be sent back to bed. But then Charles invited her to watch them. She sighed with relief and climbed onto the bed. They were both so good. She’s learned to play with Owens, the butler from back home. He’d play chess with her for hours in the kitchen. She liked it down there, she used to hide down there. Owens knew she was hiding… Did he know what she was hiding from? When Daddy came looking for her, or called her upstairs… She’d ask to be allowed to stay a little longer. But he always said to _‘do as your father says’._

A painful flash of her mother’s face appeared in her mind’s eye. People knew… They must have… _They knew and didn’t help me._ Maybe they were just as scared of Daddy as she was… Or maybe they didn’t care, maybe they thought she deserved it. A feeling of disgust swept over her, disgust with her own self that went all the way to her skeleton.

“ Can you play chess Angie?” Charles asked her, she nodded.

 “ Well then you can play the winner.” He told her.

 She didn’t think she’d give either of them a very good game, she wasn’t clever at it like them. Although she’d had practice, she was sure Owens had often let her win. As she watched her broken night began to catch up with her. She felt herself slipping towards sleep, her eyes drifting closed. No! The nightmare would come back if she wasn’t careful. That poor sad boy would come back.

 “Time for bed?”

 A soft voice beside her ear, alarm bells went off in her chest. _Time for bed._

 She shook it off…That was before, not here. This was The Professor, not Daddy. She nodded and slipped off the bed… Disgusting… Tired… Can’t sleep. Erik told her he’d leave the hallway light on. As she walked back to the dark room she found that despite her bone weariness the idea of sleep was abhorrent. So instead of going back to her room, she crept quietly downstairs to get something to drink.  
She climbed onto the kitchen countertop to get a glass, then she heard the car,and the back door rattling. There were raised voices. Raven, Hank and Alex. Were they arguing? Would they be mad that she was up so late? She quickly slipped down and under the kitchen table.

xxxxxxxxxx

The first thing that hit Charles was a pervasive sense of fear and anger. Then a solid wall of babble and memory.

  _A ballroom… Oh its all awfully boring…Music…The governors speech!… Oh sweet Christ what are we going to do!… what are …Flushed faces… The taste of Champagne… No! Not that… My own Daughter… There but for the grace of God…Genetic mutations…Oh Thank you its from Paris!… Private facility… Richard…I just don’t like it…Medical research…A sincere smile…With your help… Angie…Angie…Angie._

 He cried out. Clutching at his head. He opened his eyes to find Erik crouching in front of him, holding out the helmet. No… He needed to be aware of what was happening under his roof. But the intensity of feeling and thought was too much for him to handle up close. He struggled to put up some semblance of a shield.

 “ Charles! Put it on!”

 He shook his head. “Erik… Go and talk to them… Theres something going on… I’ll… I’ll follow you down when they’ve calmed a bit.”

 Erik left with a worried look over his shoulder. Charles immediately swung his legs out of bed and manoeuvred into his chair, then wheeled himself out into the hall, doing his best to block out the relentless throbbing of the other's thoughts and emotions.

 He felt Erik walk into the room downstairs, the various emotional reactions of the others, the hurried conversation. He had already begin to piece together the events of the evening and understand the fallout… _The anger from Raven directed towards Angie's mother… That fucking bitch! The conflicting feelings from Hank. “ You were right Erik." Oh god! If they get their hand on her and stumble across what she can do… Oh God! Alex’s downright terror and sorrow at the thought of anyone taking Angie mixing with his own memories of leaving foster homes in the middle of the night, with a police escort. They come into your house and take you away._

 Over it all was the cool mechanised rage and icy fear emanating from Erik.

_“What did you bloody idiots do? Tell me! Now!”_

_“Nothing! We didn’t do anything we just… Overheard! You should be thanking us!”_

_“ How long do we have?”_

_“ According to Fisk, the place will be up and running in eight weeks.”_

 He wanted to go down and try and make peace, to discuss what to do… He tried again to raise a shield. But the ghosts in the walls of the house were too distracting, wouldn’t let him. _Help! Someone help me… Someone? SOMEONE LISTEN TO ME!_ He heard his own child like voice calling.

 He squeezed his eyes shut. _Make yourself forget. You did this once before Charles… You can do it again._

 But the lock on the box was broken, and taping it up wouldn’t last long. And when the seal broke there would be no stopping the flood…  
With that grim understanding he ruthlessly suppressed the memories. He left the knowledge that the events happened, the outline of each trauma. But the images and feeling associated with them were back in the box. The weight of it settled like a physical lead weight in his stomach.

Things became clearer. The emotions from downstairs less overwhelming and the thoughts quieter. He sighed with relief. For now… It won’t last… But for now it will do.

xxxxxxxxx

 When he got downstairs the others had calmed down a bit. They were sitting in the rec room staring at each other. Someone had thought it prudent to open a bottle of whiskey. Four sets of eyes watched him as he rolled in. Nervous, angry, worried.

 “ Did you get all that Charles?” Raven asked him. “ Or do you need to be caught up?”

 “ No… No thank you Raven I think I understand the situation.”

 “ What are we going to do about it?” She looked so tired, drained. _Go to bed darling._ He told her. She ignored his thought.

 Charles sighed. “ Well, firstly, lets not panic. We knew we were going to have problems. This is just an obstacle…”

 “ Charles spare us the pep talk.” Erik growled from the corner. “ Call it what it is, a threat.”

 Charles sighed. The turmoil he sensed in Erik wouldn’t be placated if his concerns weren’t validated.  
“ All right then. A threat. There is a threat to one of our students. How are we going to respond?” He asked the room at large.

 “ It’s not just a threat to Angie.” Hank replied. If they’re genuinely trying to find a cure for mutation then isn’t that a threat to all of us? To the future of this school, to our future as a species?” Charles felt Hank's shame… _Just like I tried to do… Just like I still want to do._

 “ And how do we know this isn’t just a wealthy busisnessman’s misguided attempt to cure illness?” He asked . “Raven? Aside from Angie’s “condition” did they mention what kind of thing they were seeking to cure?”

 “ Astor knows more than he let on.” She replied. “ That mother of hers said they’d been looking for 'someone like her'.”

 “ To experiment on.” Erik finished her thought, _So… The cycle continues. Are we going to let it happen again? Shall we wait for them to come to the_ _door and take us away in cattle carts?_ He thought. Memories of the Gestapo and their guns racing through his mind.

 “ We won’t let that happen.” Charles snapped. “ Do try not to overreact Erik. This is one private business owners pet project not a nation wide programme.”

 “ Give it time.” Erik seethed at the unwanted invasion of his mind but didn’t reply, presumably making allowances for Charles unstable state. His effort to be patient with Charles, to sublimate his anger was almost painful to watch.

 Hank got up. “I’m going to go and destroy all my notes related to the serum.” He said quickly. “ Just in case.” He left the room hurriedly. Probably desperate to get away from the tension.

 “ Be ready for a meeting first thing tomorrow morning.” Charles told him. Hank nodded as he went.

 “ How are we going to protect her from Fisk?” Alex asked. “ The bastard obviously wants her back… Once she’s ‘normal’ again.”

 Charles felt physically sick at the idea. “ We won’t let that happen Alex.” He said quietly.

 “ How?” Asked Raven. We have no proof he did anything wrong! How are we going to stop a wealthy, powerful man reclaiming his kid from boarding school? How exactly does one do that?”

 “ By any means necessary.” Erik replied darkly.

 “ No! Not that Erik. We’re not vigilates. We don’t just go around killing people... _Anymore_ ” Charles shot back.

 Erik stood up. he walked over to stand in front of Charles’ chair. "We don’t don’t we? Well let me tell you something..."

 “ Erik!” Raven cut in. Worried for her brother, who was doing his best Erik impression, staring the other man down with rage in his eyes. “ Charles! Erik! Calm down, please just…”

 “No!" Erik snapped, without breaking his gaze."Raven, you said I needed to stop hedging my bets! that I should decide where my loyalties lie! Well I’ve decided! You wanted my loyalty and now you have it! And I’ll be dammed if I let that bastard anywhere near one of my own! If I have to kill him and anyone associated with him with my bare hands I will.”

It was the truth. They all heard the certainty in his voice, Charles heard it echo through his mind as he said it.

 “ And then?” Charles asked quietly. "Then what? Prison? Life as a fugitive? Open war with the rest of the population? Do _think_ Erik!”

 Erik turned to him. Eyes burning a hole through Charles. Who saw the exact moment Erik's patience snapped. He leaned into the chair, his hands on the armrests, his face aggressively close. He spoke in a whisper, biting off each word. 

“ Charles…You are aware of what that man did to her aren't you? You are surely not _that_ Nàive? You’re not going to pretend we don’t know _exactly_ what he wants with her... Are you?" 

Charles seemed to shrink slightly in his chair, his shoulders slumped, his anger was constant, but suddenly less like a leaping flame and more like ice.

"Oh Erik." He sighed. " I know _exactly_ what he did to her. Or have you forgotten that I met the man in person? Do you think there was any avoiding the inside of that _monsters_ mind?"

Erik seemed a little taken aback at that.

“And? What penalty do you think is befitting for a man like him?” Erik asked. “If not death?”

“ I…” Charles swallowed, suddenly alarmingly close to tears. What I know beyond a doubt is that his death won't do a _damn_ thing to heal that child... Erik you seem to be under the impression that we’re at crossed purposes. I assure you that we are not. He will _never_ touch her again… But we have to be intelligent about it. ”

“ _We_ nothing. _I’ll_ do what needs to be done. You can keep your virgin concience clean. Mine’s been used already.” He spat.

“ Stop it!” Alex cut in.” Erik!..”

“ People like him don’t change Charles.” Erik continued. “ They don’t find God and turn over a new leaf. That requires the kind of forgivenes even God can’t manage. ”

“ Erik!” Raven snapped. “Hush!” She nodded towards the door.

Angie stood there. holding the doorframe. Shaking like a leaf. Erik opened and closed his mouth wordlessly…. Charles turned in his chair and swore under his breath.

“ Angie?” Asked Raven. “How long have you been there?” The girl was shaking her head repetitively. Staring through them rather than at them.

“ Angie?” Asked Alex. “Are you ok?”

She turned and ran.

xxxxxxxxxx

 

_He’s going to get me_ … Blood was pumping in her ears…  _He’s going to get me_ … She couldn’t think… _He’s going to get me_ … Couldn’t feel… She only knew she had to get away…  _He’s coming for me_ …  _Taking me back_ … She ran into the kitchen, she could hear someone behind her as she ran, she launched herself up onto the countertop and fumbled for the window latch. Someone called her name and tried to grasp her by the upper arms. Her spines shot out on reflex and they gave a pained cry and let her go. She squirmed off the counter and ran through the house, up the stairs, through the halls, trapped by the walls and doors. She wanted to get out.

She skittered down the hallway, Her breath coming in gasping sobs. She tripped on the rug, landing hard, righted herself, flew through the door to her room and slid under the bed, making herself as small as she could, she stared out into the darkness.  
_He’ll come for me… He’s coming back… I’ll have to go back…Or Erik will kill him… kill my Daddy…Erik will kill him and go to prison. No more Erik. No more Daddy._

Something broke inside her. Her shoulders shook violently and she became aware that she was clutching her knees and the spines were making her hands and forearms bleed all over the floor. She didn’t care, in fact the pain was something to focus on. She pulled her knees in tighter. Feeling the spines tear into her.  Someone was crying. She realised it was herself, sound was coming out of her throat, for the first time in a long time. She tried to stop it but that only made it worse, leaving her hiccuping and choking.

After a short while there was the sound of footsteps outside the door. A sudden memory stirred and she curled further into the wall. He walked into the room and lay down on the floor beside the bed, looking in at her. He didn’t say anything at first. Just waited until her sobs began to decrease.

“ I used to hide in corners.” He said. “ When I was a boy…”

She squeezed her eyes shut.

“But I can only imagine Angie, what it must be like for you.”

She took a deep breath and pulled her hands away from her knees, pulling the quills out of them in the process. She hissed in pain, sliding her bloody arms over the floorboards. Watching the red drip off her fingertips. The spines had begun to retract again.

“ You weren’t supposed to hear that Libling.” He said quietly. “ You were supposed to remain blissfully ignorant, while we protected you. But thats not how things go is it? In life."

She crawled to the edge of the bed and looked out, face to face. He smiled at her sadly, and reached out to her. She winced as he took her slippery hand and helped her stand up. He sat on the bed, holding both her elbows. She tried to draw her arms back but his grip was firm.

“ Let me see.” He ordered, looking into her eyes with concern, as though he were trying to understand something about her.  _Don’t look at me._

“What happened here?” He asked her. A pause, then “ Did you do this on purpose?”

She shrugged, looking away. She had done it to herself, by accident… At first.

“ Silly girl.” He said, angrily. “ There are arteries in you wrists, you’re lucky you didn’t hit one.”

She shrugged again.

“Don’t you care?” He frowned at her.

_No._ She shook her head. She didn’t really care if she had. _let all the blood come out, wash the floorboards with it. Let me be a sad ghost in this house, at least no one can touch me._

“ Look at me!” He demanded. She purposefully looked away. Setting her jaw stubbornly. He shook her a little. “Angie. Look. At. Me.” His words were stern but there was something in his voice that did make her look at him. He had tears in his eyes. She’d never seen that before.

“Never that.” He said in a broken voice. “ Do anything… But not that. You  _Fight_ .”

Then he crossed her arms over her chest, squeezing them tightly to stop the bleeding. He pulled her into his arms. She pushed her face into his shirt and shut her eyes, blocking out the world as he lifted her and carried her downstairs. There was the squeak of wheels. And Charles’ calm voice. Erik tried to put her down but she clung to him, there was a wild sound, she might have cried out or growled. She squeezed her eyes shut even tighter.  
Then there were other voices, and then a sharp prick of a needle in her arm, then she began to float away.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

  
Hank wasn’t in the mood for drama. He’d managed to find and destroy all his notes related to mutant genetics. His fear of discovery trumping any sentimentality for his work. He had committed to memory all the important stuff anyhow. A thesis would never happen now anyway. Not with people out there hungry for the genetic key to mutation. he shuddered at the thought of his work being used by _those people_  .Over the course of the evening his own mutation had re- emerged, his blue fur had never looked bluer or furrier.

He was about to pack in in and go to bed when he heard The Professor’s voice in his head.

_Hank! Get your first aid kit out, something's happened._

Hank knew better than to waste time asking questions and got out his med pack. Charles arrived first, wheeling himself in hurriedly. He looked as though he had a migraine.

“ What happened?”

Charles glanced at the door frowning. “ I’m not entirely sure. He’s on his way down now.” Sure enough, a few seconds later Erik followed him in carrying Angie. There was blood on her pyjamas and Erik’s shirt. He instantly went in to 'surgeon mode'. An almost zen like state of moment to moment dealing with blood and whatever was causing it to leak.

The moment Erik tried to set her town on the examination table She began to scream. Hank was shocked at the sound. Since her arrival the loudest sound she'd made was a muted growl, even her tears  had been  silent.

He managed to inject her with a sedative, the minimum dose. He didn’t want her to lose consciousness. It worked, she went limp in Erik’s arms, her eyes half open.

“ Ok, Erik set her down so I can’t take a look.” Hank told him. “Erik?”

Erik was still clutching her, glassy eyed. Something was seriously wrong.

“ Erik.” Charles said copping to the problem right away. “ Put her down and get out of the lab. _Right now_!”

Erik didn’t move until Charles touched his temple and thought somthing at him. It seemed to break wherever spell Erik was under,  he shook his head and blinked. Then nodded shakilly and placed Angie gently on the table before rushing out. Hank blinked his eyes. He’d never seen Erik like that.

As Hank disinfected the wounds the kid began to stirr a little. Charles wheeled over and held her elbow and shoulder as he watched Hank work, frowning in concern. Angie calmed her movements at his touch. Once the blood  was cleaned up he was happy to see the damage looked worse than it was.

“ Luckily she didn’t hit anything vital… Although one went right though the flesh of her hand. Might need a stitch or two.”

Charles said nothing until Hank began stitching the deepest wound, The spine had torn the skin there rather than just punctured.

“ Hank?…Do these look self inflicted to you?” Charles inquired quietly, staring at the tiny forearm in his hand.

“ I dunno Professor. She’d have to have been pressing down on them pretty danm hard… It's hard to imagine this being entirely accidental.”

“ She hadn’t got proper control yet… Its possible.”

“ Possible... Yes.” Hank replied carefully, as he placed gauze and antiseptic cream to the deeper punctures. “ So what’s wrong with Erik?”

Charles sighed. “ You may have noticed he avoids coming down here.”

Hank frowned. “ Now that you mention it. He’s managed to avoid every routine check up Ive offered.”

“Why do you suppose that is?” Charles asked him, unwittingly sending a flash of memory, _Shaw’s smirking face, a childs restrained arms, a scream._

“ Oh… Oh _God_! Professor!”

“ Indeed.” Charles replied in pained voice. “ He wouldn’t have been able to sit through this.”

“ Will… Will he be ok? I mean, maybe you should check on him?”

“ I'm doing so as we speak.” Charles replied, smiling sadly. “ He’ll be fine, just needs to be alone for a while.”

Hank nodded. Concentrating on bandaging the small arm. _I don’t want to have to ever bandage this kid again_. He thought, stricken by the injustice of her situation.  _While her bastard father is at a high society party, drinking and hobnobbing..._ He hoped to God Charles wasn’t correct about her injuries being self inflicted.

“Hank.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m going to insure he never touches her,or anyone else, ever again.”

He had a moment of indignation that his thought were being violated, then remembered that Charles wasn’t as defended as usual. He probably couldn't help it.

“How? What can we do?”

“Don’t say anything to Erik yet. I don’t want him to go off half cocked.”

“Allright?”

“I want to rebuild Cerebro.”

Hank looked up astonished. “Here?”

“ Yes… Is it doable?”

“ Well… Yes I… I suppose so. With the right adjustments. I don’t see why not.”

“ How long would it take? Realisticly.“  
“

With Erik’s help with the metallic elements? Not long, a few weeks… But… Don’t take this the wrong way professor, would you be able for it? In your current...Um… Condition?”

Charles nodded. “ We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

He carefully lifted Angie off the table and carried her upstairs, Charles wheeling beside him.

“ I think we could all use a decent nights sleep.” He said quietly as Hank placed the Child into her bed. 

 

At the door to Charles' room Hank stopped, bidding The Professor goodnight.  _Professor?_   Hank thought at him, unable to keep it inside an longer. 

_Yes Hank?_

_I'm sorry... Erik was right...I was on the verge of offering you the serum earlier, when you were so sick... I'm glad I didn't now. I don't know what we'd do without your abilities. You... You hold this place together._

Charles smiled at the young man.   _We all have our part to play. None of us entirely sure of ourselves. It will be all right in the end , you'll see._

xxxxxxxxx

After pulling himself together. Erik had been the one to clean the blood off Angie's bedroom floor, there was a surprising amount of it. He made a mental note to leave the child some juice on her nightstand to help with blood loss. The bed was a mess, telling of her sleepless night. He smoothed the sheet, pulling the edges straight.

Something fell from beneath the mattress. He picked it up, frowning at the small book in his hand. 


End file.
